Faith
by vethia
Summary: Shuichi is missing, and only Ryuichi can help Yuki Eiri find him. But is Sakuma-san telling the truth, and is Eiri really up to the task...? Nothing is as it seems. COMPLETE AT LAST!
1. Visit

**notes****:**

this story was co-authored by my good friend midori-chan (you can find her on www.livejournal.com under the username "soujiro_seta" or here on ff.net with the user number 342176), who agreed to allow me to edit and post it. the general rule is that she handled ryuichi while i took yuki. i've tried to do a seamless edit so that it sounds like one person's writing, but i've never done anything like this before, heh… so you'll all have to let me know how i did. 

standard disclaimer: no, of course i don't own gravitation. if i did, i'd be a lot richer than i am right now. don't sue me.

that being said, please enjoy the first chapter of  "faith" ^^

-vethia

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**Faith**

The cheerful knock at the door was startling, to say the least. Until that sound, the only thing to break the silence in the sparse Tokyo apartment had been the _tap-tap-tap of fingers against a keyboard. Deep golden-green eyes looked up from their work with annoyance, frowning at the interruption. Hesitating only a moment, the man who owned them decided to remove his reading glasses before answering the door. As soon as he saw who was behind it, he was very glad he had._

            Within seconds, the interrupted novelist's vision was obscured by a mess of bright pink plush fur. "Guess who?" the childish voice rang out excitedly.

            "Hello, Sakuma-san."

            The man at the door twisted his voice into a high-pitched caricature. "It's not Sakuma-san!! It's… KUMAGOROU!!"

            Beneath the pink fur, the owner of the apartment raised a single eyebrow. "Is it, now? My mistake. Hello, Kumagorou." He was rewarded momentarily by a fleeting glimpse of his hallway as one plush pink paw was removed just long enough to wave. 

            "Hiiiiii!" the stuffed rabbit returned, quickly covering his eyes again. "Hey, where's Ryuichi-kun?"

            The writer figured it would be easier to play along. "I haven't… _seen_ Sakuma-san," he replied carefully. The Kumagorou-voice wondered aloud, "Hum… where could he be?" Still muffled behind pink paws, the man answered dryly, "I really couldn't say."

            "Here I am!" caroled a voice whose exuberance rivaled that of the earlier knock. As quickly as they had appeared, the pink balls of fluff were removed, resolving themselves into the paws of Sakuma Ryuichi's plush bunny friend, Kumagorou.

            With a soft sigh, Yuki Eiri, famous Japanese novelist, closed the door to his apartment. "Hello, Sakuma-san." He was still at a loss to explain why Nittle Grasper's lead singer was prancing around his house. While it was true that Sakuma-san was friends with Eiri's lover Shuichi—as well as a professional rival—it was only Eiri in the apartment at the moment. Unfortunately, this didn't stop Sakuma-san from hopping in with a big grin. "Hi!!" 

            Seeing that the singer planned to make himself at home, Eiri turned and strode over to the couch, sinking down and pulling out a pack of cigarettes. "What are you doing here…?" His tone was neither accusatory nor angry, just… tired. Without looking at Ryuichi, he lit up and sucked in a puff of smoke.

            "Na, I wanted to come over!" Sakuma-san practically bounced over to Eiri's seat, peering at the lighter.  "SHUU-CHAN!" he exclaimed, face lighting up at the sight of the picture stuck to the side of the incendiary device.

            Eiri quickly stuffed the lighter back into his pocket with a gruff "…I see." The singer grinned as if sharing some private joke, then perched on the edge of the couch, staring rather curiously at the walls. After a few moments of gazing at the floor, blowing faint smoke clouds, the writer inquired with a slightly bitter tone, "Did Tohma send you? To 'check up' on me?"

Ryuichi grinned. "Tohma would do his _own_ dirty work if he wanted to 'check up' on you…" With an inane laugh, he lifted one of Kumagorou's paws, waving it in the air.

            "Hnh. I suppose you're right." Eiri took another long drag off his cigarette. "Then why _are you here…? I'm not known as good company."_

            The singer adjusted his headband, pushing the unruly brown bangs out of his eyes. "Kumagorou told me to," he replied, as if this explained everything. he even pointed to K-chan for emphasis.

            "…Oh. I see." Yuki turned his gaze to Kumagorou for a moment, as if studying the plush pink face, then stood rather abruptly and moved to the window, snuffing out the half-smoked cigarette in the ashtray on his way.

            Ryuichi rolled over on the couch to where Eiri had been sitting...and found himself somewhat stuck in the groove between the cushions, still grinning over at the writer. "...You miss Shuu-chan now that he's on tour?"  
            A muscle jumped in Eiri's jaw. Luckily, his back was to the other man, narrowed eyes gazing down at the bustle of the city. He shoved his hands in his pockets before answering--or rather, evading--the question. "Who would miss a messy, whiny, annoying idiot?"

            "Maaaa, I would—I already miss him!!!" Ryuichi burst into sobs, still stuck in the groove of Eiri-san's couch. The tall man turned, brows creasing in a slight frown. He strode over to the couch, reached one hand in, and extracted Ryuichi, setting him upright before turning away again without a word. The singer continued with a sniff as he wiped his tears on Kumagorou's ear "Shuu-chan misses _you..."  
            Upon hearing this, Eiri looked back sharply, eyes narrowing, expression otherwise unreadable. "How do _you_ know?"By way of answer, Ryuichi produced a 5-inch stack of letters addressed to Yuki Eiri, decorated with hearts and stars and little chibi pictures of the intended recipient. "Tohma's been screening your mail."_

"…I see." The news about Tohma wasn't particularly pleasing to Eiri's ears, but he turned away before any displeasure could be noted, responding at last to the first declaration. "If he does, it's his own stupid fault." 

            "That's unkind..." Ryuichi dropped Kumagorou rather suddenly, with a kind of wistful and strangely harrowing expression upon his face. 

            "And what if it is..?" Eiri snapped. One hand reached up to brush the hair back from his eye, lingering against his forehead for a moment before dropping to his side. "Perhaps Tohma is right. He would be better off without me."

            Ryuichi brushed back his hair in the same fashion Eiri had, almost mocking him, in a sort of cynical sense. His eyes closed as he nonchalantly abandoned Kumagorou and his suddenly-lost innocence on the couch and he walked towards Eiri. "That's sad...that you have so little faith in yourself." He moved to the window where Eiri stood, gazing out into the bleak rain with a wan smile imprinted on his features.  

            The self-styled 'Yuki' watched Ryuichi out of the corner of his eye, thoughts spinning around one another in a dizzying haze. His gaze measured the man's features, noting the change in demeanor. For a moment, he seemed about to reply, but he quickly clamped down on whatever it was he was going to say. Instead he elected to pull another cigarette from his pocket, lighting it quickly and stuffing the lighter back to avoid lingering on the picture stuck to the metal.

Ryuichi's sapphire orbs glinted dully in the artificial light of the room—there was something he wasn't telling Eiri. He tried to hide the fact that he knew something the blonde-haired man did not, but the opaqueness in his eyes could not help but betray him as he opened his mouth. One word fell silently onto the windowpane. "Shuichi..."

            The dull golden eyes flicked upwards, narrowly regarding Ryuichi. Eiri's words dripped out around the cigarette, tiny trails of ash falling unnoticed to the floor. "What about him?"

            A sick smile graced Ryuichi's face. "Everyone else from Bad Luck is back from the tour. These letters stopped coming weeks ago."

            The cigarette fell to the floor, unheeded, as Eiri swallowed in spite of himself. His eyes widened slightly, then contracted in anger. "Why... didn't anyone _tell_ me?" Contained rage was evident in his voice; cold and banked, but anger nonetheless.

            Ryuichi didn't even bother to look at the seething man—he found it safer to stare out of the window, almost mechanically, as he spoke in a flat monotone. "I thought you said he'd be better off without you...?"

            Eiri growled silently, simultaneously acknowledging and denying Ryuichi's words. "Is he all right?"

            Strikingly cold cerulean blue eyes met the writer's, rivaling even Eiri's famous cold glare. "Seguchi-san will kill me when he finds out I told you—" The other man cut him off with a voice like a scalpel made of ice. "Tohma should learn to stay out of my business," he snarled. "Tell me what happened."

            Ryuichi twitched slightly at the piercing voice, changing drastically from his cold state to a more tired, chocolate-crowned boy. He ran a hand through his hair somewhat tentatively and leaned a little heavily upon the windowsill. 'You remember Shining Collection?"

            "Of course I remember. What about it...?"

            "The song you wrote for Shuichi... It was such a hit with the general populous, Seguchi-san wanted you to write more lyrics for NG." He shot a helpless glare at Eiri. "He favours your lyrics more than mine...he just wants me to sing."

            Eiri sniffed, turning away. "Well, he can forget it. I did that for a reason; it happened once, and that's it. What does this have to do with Shuichi? Tohma didn't _tell_ him that... did he?"

            A shake of negation was Ryuichi's reply. Hair fell over his eyes as he turned his head towards the window again, still speaking. "That's just a precursor. Tohma told Shuichi he wanted you as a lyricist, and they argued for awhile. Shuichi didn't seem to like the idea of using your relationship as a basis for making songs for NG. Tohma said he didn't care, he would do it anyway, and I—I was jealous of you. I didn't want to do anything, but I did start making lyrics for Bad Luck as a way to..." He paused, searching for words. "…a silly way of getting back at you. Some record producer wanted Bad Luck to tour around Europe for publicity of my written songs, and...Shuichi never came back."

            Eiri's first reaction was no more than a furious snarl. A few moments of tense silence filled the room. When he spoke again, it was with that same cold rage. "And of course, Tohma had no plans to consult _me_ about any of this. Naturally." With a sharp turn, he headed for the couch, picking up the suit-jacket lying lazily across the arm. "Where was he last seen?"

            Following on Eiri's heels, Ryuichi ran to the couch and picked up Kumagorou, suddenly regaining the brightness in his cheeks. "I'm coming with you!"

            "No. You're not."

            Ryuichi nods stubbornly. "Yes, I am."

            An irritated glance was tendered to the singer. "Why do you want to come?" A smile adorned Ryuichi's face, making two kawaii circles pop out from his cheeks. "I wanna say 'hi' to Shuu-chan!"

            A roll of the golden eyes was Eiri's only reply. "I suppose you won't tell me where he is unless I let you come." It was a statement, not a question, and spoken with bland resignation.

            "Kyaaaa~~!" The writer was almost immediately attacked by a bouncing Ryuichi. "We'll have so much fun!"

            "_Ooof__--!" Patience wearing thin, Eiri smacked Ryuichi away, growling. " 'Fun' is _not_ the word I would use." Straightening his jacket, he scooped the Beamer's keys from the coffee table and headed for the door, giving every impression of being indifferent to Ryuichi's decision to follow._

            Ryuichi sang a happy tune as he let go of Eiri-san to skip behind him merrily, not minding the smack. "And then with Shuu-chan, we'll have lots of fun..." He stopped for a moment of consideration, then remarked to Kumagorou, "But they might not want me around if they're together...they might want to..." The sentence trailed off as he giggled at his childish innuendo.

            Choosing to ignore this little dialogue, Eiri rolled his eyes as he locked the door, then strode down the hallway. Words were tossed over his shoulder, pitched to land just in front of Ryuichi. "Tell me where he is."

            Ryuichi grabbed the words up eagerly as if they were candy, but his reply was not quite what the other had hoped for. "Na no da~~, not until I know I'm coming with you." Eiri growled under his breath. Ryuichi was much cannier than he liked to seem, and the novelist knew it... but it wasn't terribly convenient. He reached the elevator and stepped inside, briefly considering shutting the door before the singer could board out of sheer spite, but restrained himself admirably.

            Seeming to comprehend the blonde's inner thoughts, Ryuichi grinned as he hopped inside the elevator with Eiri, Kumagorou close in tow. "Sankyuuu." He leaned against the elevator wall, smiling at Eiri for awhile before finally speaking up. "The last text message I got from him was from London."

            A curt nod greeted this information, but no more—Eiri was already planning the fastest driving route to the airport. From the elevator, it was merely a few short meters to the waiting BMW. It would be the easiest thing in the world to simply deny Ryuichi entrance to the vehicle, now that the desired information was in his possession—but for some reason, Eiri does not. Instead, he allows the car to idle, only speeding off after the dark-haired man attains a position in the passenger's seat.

            _I hope I'm not getting myself into more than I can handle… _


	2. Phone Call

disclaimer: blah blah blah, no gravitation rights for me. see ch. 1 for full statement.

            Ryuichi beamed in gratitude to the driver of the BMW before digging into one of his pockets to retrieve a cell phone adorned with a small plushie of his beloved Kumagorou. He began to press buttons, filling the car with a mechanical bleeping. After a few seconds, the boy pressed the phone to his ear. "Hiro-kun?" A pause. "Ah, yes, I'm great, you? Ah... listen. I need to know where was the last time you saw Shuu-chan." He paused again, presumably to listen to the other party=s answer. AWhy? Eh, no reason, I want to see if K-san can locate him...@ He began to weave his delicately threaded web of lies, pausing every so often to add another falsehood to his complex story as he extracted information from the Bad Luck guitarist. His plush bunny slid farther down from his warm lap, falling on the floor and mirroring almost exactly what had happened between it and Ryuichi in Eiri-san's apartment.

            The driver's eyes seemed, at first glance, to be entirely on the road. This was not, of course, the case. Eiri flipped a pair of dark sunglasses out of a pocket and settled them on his face, though whether or not this was meant to hide the sideways glances he continues to bestow upon his passenger is unclear. He noted the position of the pink plushie with a purely mental sniff of acknowledgement, letting his foot ride heavily on the gas pedal. Sweeping around curves and darting between other cars, he listened with at least half his attention. Probably not be the best idea when driving, but Eiri did it anyway. At that moment, knowing _exactly_ what Sakuma-san was telling Shuichi's best friend was distinctly more important.            

            "Ummhmm..." The boy's voice seemed to drift languidly across the passenger seat as the bunny came to a flopping halt upon the carpeted floor of the vehicle. His eyes were fixed on the road ahead, ear pressed to the speakerphone of his cell as he listened intently. "How about the time? ...yeah, it'll help with things..." _'Things' being a rather broad subject_, he thought to himself, adding a half-hearted 'na no da' to make it seem as if he were sincere. 

  


            The guitarist=s speech was suddenly interrupted by a quiet beep from the phone. Ryuichi blinked for a moment as he tilted his head and gazed at the device curiously. "Ah, Hiro-kun... there's someone on the other line...hold on."  He clicked over to the other call and listened for mere moments before his eyes widened in recognition, color beginning to drain from his once rosy cheeks. "Ano....Seguchi-san..."

            _Tohma__ is calling Ryuichi...?_ Eyes which had drifted back to the asphalt before him jerked up at the mention of this name. Eiri didn't make a sound, but the deadly look in his eyes was more than enough to convey the snarl which he would certainly voice if not for the proximity of the phone. Nearly _all_ his attention drew in to focus on the conversation. The man's driving style became almost absent; Eiri only narrowly avoided several collisions as the beamer's speed continued to increase.

            Ryuichi's gaze drifted helplessly over to the blonde-haired driver. His face was that of a ghost, his trembling lips fumbling to form words. "Hi...how are you? F-fine...? Good, that's good to know..." His eyes became even more desperate, pleading with the driver. "Where...where am I?"

            Eyes narrowed, one trained on Sakuma-san, one keeping an eye on the other cars, Eiri mouthed, _"Going out."_

            "I'm going out!" Ryuichi nodded effervescently, almost as if he were talking to Tohma face to face. "Where?" He paled again in reaction to the voice on the other line. "Out... with Kumagorou!" The singer grinned hopefully into the phone, hoping the person on the other end would accept his lie. "Alright, I won't be out too late...heh..." The last sentence was exhaled in a single breath—"Sankyuu, Seguchi-san..."—and quickly, he clicked back to Hiro.

            Eiri exhaled as Tohma apparently believed the lie—or, at any rate, caused no more trouble—grateful that he wouldn't have to think up anything else. His eyes returned, in part, to the road, though he was still listening quite carefully to Ryuichi's conversation.

            "Hiro? Hi, sorry that took so long..." Though the phone undoubtedly did not benefit, Ryuichi bowed his head kind of in apology. "Yes. You say the last time you saw him was around a concert hall in London...after the concert. Okay... Hey, Hiro? If Tohma asks you about anything, just say I have everything under control, ok? Okay. Thanks." 

            He clicked the phone off, almost uninterestedly, and turned to Eiri as if the writer were his partner-in-crime. "I was the last person Shuichi messaged before he went missing. Hiro's just re-stating things I already know." The singer glanced down to see his K-chan staring up at him through silent glassy eyes and 'kee'ed in happiness as he hugged the doll to his chest. "Does this mean we're gonna be detectives?! Like Sherlock Holmes and Watson?? Who do you wanna be?" He grinned innocently up at Eiri, demeanor completely altered. 

            Eiri growled out loud this time, the dangerous phone now safely tucked away. "No games, Sakuma-san." His eyes narrowed in irritation, though whether this was due to the other, to himself, or was a mask altogether is impossible to say. "Tohma _will_ find out where you are. Do you still insist on coming?"

            The boy grinned, almost as if Eiri had told him a funny joke. "Yep yep! Because I know, someone has to keep you company when Shuu-chan's not around, coz you get _lonely…" He bounced in the comfortable passenger seat, eyes glittering with a thousand smiles. Eiri bit back a sharp denial, knowing full well that it would do no good whatsoever. He snarled silently at the mirror-eyes. It was a different approach, to be sure, to shine so brightly that no-one could see what was on the inside... he preferred to put up a blank wall, but to each his own. Without further comment, he turned off of the highway, heading for the airport. _

            As the car glided onto the exit ramp, an electronic tone cut through the air and Eiri reached for his phone with an expression of irritation. Checking the caller ID seemed only to anger him further, and he flipped the phone open and snarled, "What do you want?"

            Ryuichi blinked in curiosity and hid his face behind his Kumagorou. "Who is it?" A quick sideways glare cautioned the singer to be silent as Eiri spoke. "I don't have time to talk, Mika..." He moved to hang up, but was stopped by words from the phone. "No. No. Yes. I haven't seen him. ...No, I _don't_ care. You are wasting my time." His words were accompanied by a snarl of disgust. A pause gave the other party time to speak, then; "I have things to do. I'm hanging up now." He shut the phone with a _snap_, shoving it back into his pocket.

            Ryuichi's eyes suddenly became large and starry and he produced a pad of paper and pencil from nowhere. "KAWAAAIII!! That was neat!! So mean!! Can I have your autograph, Eiri-san?!!?"

            The exasperated Eiri growled angrily. "_No!_ ...We're almost there." He turned off at last, speeding into the airport and heading straight for valet parking. Ryuichi, however, was not to be dissuaded. 

            "Waaaah..." All of a sudden, the boy's eyes sported large teardrops where none had been before. He began to offer Eiri his jewelry as a barter for the novelist's autograph. "No? If I give you my ring, will you give me your autograph?"  Eiri pulled into the parking lot and got out of the car, annoyed glare following Ryuichi as he tendered his keys to the valet. "Later. We are busy now."

            With a sniff, the boy acquiesced and stashed his pad and paper away. He followed Eiri out of the car, hugging his Kumagorou protectively to his chest. "Alright. But you have to promise, you'll give me an autograph...pleeaaaseee...."

            The novelist rolled his eyes behind dark glasses. "Later. And don't be so damn loud. We'll get mobbed." His tone was acidic, probably due at least in part to the wide, starry eyes of the valet as he filled out the paperwork to have the BMW stored indefinitely. The form was signed with reluctance, and Eiri was _not_ pleased to see that the valet took the papers back as if they were made of spun gold. Turning abruptly on his heel, the man headed inside, leaving Sakuma-san to follow or not as he chose.

            Ryuichi turned to the valet parking lot attendant, grinning as he waves sporadically to him with a chirpy 'hiiiiiiiiii!!!' reverberating in the hallways of the concrete lot. He donned his green sunglasses and bounced off, waving a happy hello to a group of teens passing by him to get to their car. 

            Big mistake. The teens were obviously aware of both Eiri's _and Sakuma-san's professions and were now hurling at them in a screaming mob. Eiri set his face to a completely blank expression, shoved his hands into his pockets, and continued on his way. Sakuma-san could deal with his _own_ fans in his _own_ way. With any luck, Eiri would be able to lose the musician and continue on his way without further interference. _

            Ryuichi, by contrast, at first seemed enthralled with his mob of fans, but after some loud screaming and rather _inappropriate_ touching he zoomed away from the crowd and clung to the retreating novelist instead. "Eiiiiiriiiii-saaaannnn...." He wailed out Eiri's name petulantly, and the mob had chosen its new target. 

            Yuki's scowl became visible as the mob careened towards him, following closely on Sakuma-san's heels. He kept walking, allowing both crowd and celebrity to catch up with him, wading through the starry-eyed fans in an attempt to make it to the door. From there, security would doubtless handle the situation... or so he hoped.

            Answering Eiri's prayers, large, burly men held back the crowd, whose members hissed in protest like a basket of angry snakes as they were restrained. With the aid of this intervention the two men attained passage into the airport. Ryuichi heaved a sigh and glomped himself onto Eiri even more, staring back at the scene of their narrow escape with wide eyes. "Skeery..."

            Eiri managed to keep a fairly calm expression until the two passed out of sight of the frustrated crowd, slipping behind a corner. As soon as made it out of the fans' view, however, his shoulders slumped in a rare moment of weakness and he scowled, readjusting his sunglasses. Turning to Sakuma-san, he growled, "Do that again... and I will leave you behind. For good." The sincerity of his tone was unequivocally echoed in his flashing, narrowed eyes.

            Ryuichi cowered backwards, frightened by the penetrating ice of Eiri's stare, and nodded rather sedately, lips forming a slight pout. He turned his sapphire eyes up to cowardly meet Eiri's and asked in a rather suppressed tone, "Ma...do you like it better when I'm serious?"

            The subject of this address lifted his sunglasses to peer at the subdued form before him, blinking in something which, in another man, might have resembled confusion. Could Ryuichi actually be... _admitting_ to his violent mood shifts? _Do I like it better when he's serious...?_ After a moment's blank stare, he allowed the dark shades to fall down over his eyes again and spoke. "I meant that you should not draw attention to us." He turned on his heel, neatly sidestepping the question, but leaving a glaring hole where an affirmation might have fallen.

            The green sunglasses slipped further down the boy's nose in despair. His eyes shifted to the floor and K-chan began to droop in his arms. He only nodded, seeming to understand although it also seemed like he wasn't all there, either. "Right......."

            Eiri turned at this, just the barest backwards glance over his shoulder, and frowned—though the expression was admirably hidden by his own shades. After a brief moment of hesitation, he spoke again, though this time with an ever-so-slightly softer tone. "Come on, or...." He completed the sentence almost grudgingly, well-hidden compassion warring with well-worn masks, "...we will miss our flight." 

            When he saw the expression Eiri wore, Ryuichi's face lifted nearly five inches from the position it had absentmindedly settled into. He grinned, eyes sparkling—perhaps _slightly_ duller than they had been before—as he captured the sliding glasses and pushed them proudly upon the bridge of his nose. "Okay," he laughed, holding Kumagorou close to him like a security blanket—or a security bunny, if one were inclined to be so literal. "Okay, Eiri-san."

well, there you have it… chapter 2. ^^ more forthcoming, of course. next chapter: trials and tribulations with ticket counters and airport security. eiri discovers the joys of counting to ten, and there may even be a clue as to shuichi's whereabouts. stay tuned! *grin*

-vethia & midori-chan


	3. Text Message

insert standard disclaimer here. see chapter 1 for full "no of course i don't own gravitation" statement

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            Eiri allowed his hidden gaze to rest on the musician for a moment more, as if searching for something, then nodded once and turned towards the ticket counter. Settling himself at the end of one of the lines, he squinted up at the departure board, trying to figure out which flight would be fastest that wasn't already full.

            Ryuichi followed the novelist closely, seemingly engrossed in speaking with his plushy friend. "Isn't this exciting, K-chan?! London..." For a moment, his eyes drifted to where Eiri's were, but they quickly fastened back upon his bunny's leaden ones as he spoke in a soft, excited voice, almost like a small child to his or her imaginary friend.

            The blonde kept one eye on Sakuma-san to make sure the rock star wasn't calling any more attention to them, but the man seemed to be appropriately occupied with his pink companion. Relieved, Eiri took this time to figure out their flight plan, and had everything worked out by the time the woman at the counter asked, in her repulsively cheerful voice, "How may I help you, sir?" Luckily, he managed to keep a blank expression despite his keen desire to punch her in the face. 

            "Two for flight 1176 to London." The woman grinned and began tapping away at her computer. "Passports?" she asked, in that sugary tone. Eiri proffered his wordlessly, then stepped aside for Sakuma-san to come forward, expecting little trouble.

            Ryuichi, who was rather obsessed with his dear friend, did not even register the situation until the woman asked again, "Passports?" rather calmly. But oh ho ho, she did _not know the burden she would be dealing with... Ryuichi blinked up at her with surprising innocence, and then shoved Kumagorou in the poor woman's face, looking very cute. "Hiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiii~~!"_

            Eiri resisted the tremendous urge to slap his hand against his forehead. Instead, he hissed in a much more controlled manner: "Sakuma-san... your passport. Give it to the woman. _Now." In return he received an emotional display of teary eyes from Ryuichi. _

            "But...but...KUMAGOROU DOESN'T HAVE HIS PASSPORT!!!!"

            _Count to ten. That's what the shrink said, right..? Count to ten... "Kumagorou does not need a passport. _You_ do."_

            "Haa? Weally? So I can take Kumagorou with me?!?! _Yaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaayyy__!!! Saaankyuu!!" Without warning, he randomly clotheslined Eiri and the sugary sweet woman in a group glomp. A choking gasp was Eiri's first response. The second, of course, was to throw Ryuichi off of him, snapping "Baka..." under his breath. Eyes glinting dangerously, he lowered his sunglasses and peered over them at the hapless singer. "Just give her the passport. If you don't, you're not coming."_

            "....Mou..." The vocalist peered up at his intimidating companion for a moment in fear, almost as if he thought the man would beat him. He then shoved his hand in his pocket hurriedly, and gave the woman his passport—more of a passport of Kumagorou than himself—and waited, bouncing on his heels as she began to type up the flight information.

            Eiri clicked his glasses back into place and waits for the tickets, grinding his teeth—and in this man's case, it wasn't just a literary expression. Finally, she looked up again. "That will be 245,000 yen for each ticket." Eiri handed over a credit card and looked expectantly at Sakuma-san.

            Ryuichi mimicked Eiri's stare, looking back at him with questioning eyes. Finally, he held up Kumagorou and asked politely, "Would you like to talk to Kumagorou too?"

            _Why me...? Eiri closed his eyes for a moment. __Eight... nine... ten. Count completed, he growled to the ticket woman, "Together." The young woman, knowing better than to get in the middle of this, just nodded her head and swiped the card. She even managed to tone down her demeanor, which did Eiri a world of good. With a brief and silent prayer of thanks to whatever gods were protecting her today, she handed the tickets to the blonde man and kept her tight smile. _At least they're going away now_. "Next!"_

            The vocalist seemed puzzled as to why Eiri-san and the woman were acting so odd—he sniffed his Kumagorou. Well, okay, K-chan didn't smell like a bed of roses, but he wasn't _that _bad...

            Eiri took the tickets and headed towards the security checkpoint, deliberately choosing the furthest metal director to the left. He went directly to the guard, took out his wallet, and handed the man a document. The guard squinted at the paper slightly, then frowned at Eiri's coat. The novelist remained impassive throughout. A brief dialogue ensued, then Eiri slipped something out of his jacket, carefully turned so that no-one could see, and placed the item on the belt. Having done so, he passed through the metal detector without incident, retrieving the item on the other side and slipping it back into its place again.

            Ryuichi, lacking Eiri's aplomb, began to make a big fuss that 'Kumagorou might get cancer' if the toy were x-rayed, and, after a long discussion, mostly filled with 'But sir's and angry 'Na no da's, they allowed him to pass through the metal detector _with_ his bunny. And, lo and behold, the metal detector went off. Ryuichi paused in the doorway of the bleeping machine and stared up at the red blinking light for nearly a minute until he remarked in passing to the security guard, "...I think there's something wrong with it...."

            _Six... seven... eight... Eiri leaned against the wall, arms crossed, scowl mostly hidden behind his carefully-placed sunglasses. __What does the thing have, metal joints...? He ground his teeth again. It probably wasn't good for them. With considerable restraint, he forced himself to wait for Sakuma-san, while simultaneously hoping that no-one would think they were together._

            First things to go were Ryuichi's rings; then after a second try, his myriads of bracelets; then after the third try...his anklets... fourth try...the belts... Finally, the security guards wanted to take away the singer's bunny, but Ryuichi would not stand for this. If the security guards try so much as to touch the rock star's plush pal, he beans them over the head with it. People started to gather as the security staff struggled to take away the boy's rabbit, rewarded each time with a smack on the head by a fuzzy animal.

            _This has gone far enough. Eiri waded into the fray and the people mysteriously parted around him. Maybe it was something in his expression, that cold and far-too-dangerous scowl which frightened men out of their wits without ever having a clear-cut reason to do so. Maybe it was the manner of his walk; quick, strong, and direct. Maybe was just the presence he exuded. In any case, he made it to Sakuma-san's side at last, careful to stay out of the metal detector. "Put it on the conveyor," he growled. "I don't have time for this."_

            Again, Ryuichi stared at him for a moment, a little fearfully, then quickly acquiesced to the blonde's demands and placed Kumagorou on the conveyor belt, giving the man operating it a nasty stare until the rabbit came out clean on the other end. He was asked to walk through the metal detector one last time, but surprisingly, nothing happened. With a little bit of effort, he placed his belts, anklets, rings, AND bracelets back on, being sure to collect K-chan at the end of the conveyor belt and shoot another glare at the confused security guards staring after the two. Finally, he retrieved Kumagorou and, huggling it, said to Eiri as they walked towards the gate, "You're skeery, Eiri-saan..."

            Walking quietly beside and a little bit in front of Ryuichi, Eiri sighed very, very softly—almost so that it could escape detection. If not for the dark glasses, one might have noticed a strange expression pass across his eyes... luckily for him, the dark twin masks were still in place. "I know," he answered.

            Moments later, they reached the gate, where their flight was (by some amazing chance) boarding in only ten minutes. Engrossed in thought, Eiri seated himself in the waiting area, staring blankly out the window. How many times had he sat, just like this, waiting for a plane to take him to some other country...? He pushed such thoughts away with a scowl.

            Ryuichi had a hand upon the windowpane of the waiting area, staring over into the blue sky with a content, yet wistful expression upon his face. He looked back towards Eiri, scowling a couple seats away, and frowned slightly. Turning back to the window, Ryuichi continued staring out into the vast cerulean ocean painted with cottonballs and at the faint rainbow glimmering faintly across its expanse from the previous rain they had had. In the midst of all this, his cell gave a cute chirp, and he tore himself away from the pleasant view to answer his phone. "Um...a text message...?" he wondered out loud, then started as he read the name of the author. "Shuu.......ichi....?"

            Eiri's head jerked up immediately. "What does it say?" 

            His eyes affixed to the tiny screen, Ryuichi pressed buttons frantically until the desired answer popped into clear view upon the phone. Ryuichi nearly dropped his cell, face paling considerably, and he was overcome by a sick look. He turned the phone towards Eiri, the phone shaking slightly. On the screen were two words, all caps: HELP ME.

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look, chapter 3! hope it was enjoyable. ^^ i know this one was kinda short, but i just couldn't resist cutting it there *smiiiiiiiirk*

next chapter: more text messages, an argument, and the flight to london. sakuma-san might not be telling everything he knows…

oh, and a new policy… as mentioned earlier, this story is pretty much all written, it just needs to be edited. but it's no fun to post if we don't get feedback! so please, read and review, because if we don't get enough feedback on this chapter, it might not be worthwhile to post the next. 

-vethia & midori-chan  
  


4.29.03 UPDATE – why didn't you people _tell_ me how many errors were in this?! oi. i may be an editor, but i was doing this chapter quickly and it seems that i missed a lot of stuff. should be fixed now (or at any rate, the more blatant problems should be). still waiting for more feedback before posting the next chapter. let's see some character critiques and speculations about the plot! *grin* 

oh, and in response to ayako's latest comment…. yes. yes, we are. ^___________________^

-v & m-chan


	4. Plane Flight

disclaimer, as usual. if gravi were mine, there's no way i would have this many student loans. _

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            The simple characters stared out mutely from the softly glowing screen. Eiri's eyes widened in shock as his glasses nearly fell off of his nose. Catching them quickly, he grabbed the phone and tapped out a reply: "_where are you?_"

            The reply came back slowly, in about three tension-filled minutes—DON'T KNOW. SOMEWHERE DARK. The novelist's lips tightened. His hand trembled only slightly as he typed back, "_we are coming to __london__. how did you get where you are? tell us how to fi--_" Unfortunately, he quickly ran out of space. Growling slightly, he erased the last two sentences, rewrote the message to read "_we are coming to __london__. tell me everything that happened_" and clicked send.

            Ryuichi's face was paling even more—he looked like he was about to faint. He leaned against the window, making a visible effort to stay conscious as his phone beeped again, this time with an extremely short, succinct message… almost as if it were cut off while someone was writing it. I CAN'T—****

Eiri shook the phone, almost as if begging it to reveal more information, then turned to Ryuichi with narrowed eyes. "What do you know about this..?" he growled.****

            "…Nothing." He pressed his head to the cold window, eyes flickering for a moment and then fading as more color drained from his cheeks. His beloved rabbit fell from his lax hand and onto the floor as he breathed out a sigh, marring the windowpane with frost.

            With an almost inhuman snarl, Eiri grabbed the singer by the collar and pulled him close, glaring down with a mixture of anger, fear, and anguish in the greenish-gold eyes. Luckily, the two were fairly close to begin with, so this rough motion went fairly unnoticed by the other patrons of the airport. "No more games. Tell me _everything_ you know. Right. NOW."****

"...Let go of me." The singer's cheeks suddenly flushed with a hidden rage, and he smacked Eiri back with surprising force as he freed himself from the strangling grasp.****

            Those same greenish-gold eyes widened in shock as Eiri found himself struck backwards. The man simply stareed, dumbfounded, for a moment before his eyes narrowed again. With tightly controlled rage, he asked, "Why did you tell me what was going on if you weren't going to tell me the whole truth...?"

            Ryuichi blinked at him in utter amazement, eyes sparkling with a hidden malevolent laughter. "Did you think I was telling the truth the whole time?"

            Eiri scowled, cheeks reddening slightly as he realizes how easily he had been led. Inwardly, he cursed himself. _This is what comes of having a heart... Tohma was right. I should never have gotten involved with Shindou Shuichi._ Slowly, the rage in his eyes cooled to something less describable and infinitely colder, then faded to a blank mask. He seemed about to speak when the airport loudspeaker broke in, cutting him off. "_Flight 6734 non-stop to London now boarding at Gate B_," it proclaimed. Holding Sakuma-san's eyes for a final cold, hard moment, he brushed past the other man, heading for the gate on his own. _I don't need him. I'll do this on my own and his 'information' be damned. What good will it do me if he's just going to withhold things...?_

            As Eiri brushed past him, Ryuichi whispered something in his ear. "If you leave him, Sakuma-san will be so upset... he really wants you to trust him and think he's responsible....but...seeing that you don't care about him anyway...I'll just take him and leave..."

            Eiri stopped short, exactly even with the other man. For a moment, he seemed to have simply paused there, frozen in time. _This is like a bad novel..._ His gaze didn't waver, still fixed solidly on his destination... but at last, one hand moved, holding up the two plane tickets... waiting.

            "Hn." The singer smiled sickeningly for a moment, until he picked up his Kumagorou and the smile instantly changed from devious to innocent and shiny. The boy grinned up at Eiri, eyes alight with mirth. "Are we ready to go now?"

            Eiri's eyes turned at last to regard his companion (for companion he seemed to be, regardless of the writer's wishes), blank and withdrawn. His voice was expressionless. "Yes."

            Ryuichi's face fell when he heard the tone in Eiri's voice. "What is it? What's wrong, Eiri-san?" He held his Kumagorou tighter still to his chest, the plush's button eyes bugging out from the sheer force of his hug.

            Eiri seemed nothing if not... tired. "Nothing. Come on." He started his approach again, handing the two first-class tickets to the stewardess as she smilingly welcomed them aboard. Yuki settled his shades more firmly against his nose and shoved his hands in his pockets, boarding without another word.

            Ryuichi was quite taken with both the walkway and the interior of the plane as he 'ooh'ed and 'aah'ed over the metallic structures, running his pink bunny over everything he could possibly touch—sometimes even other passengers, though all the while avoiding touching Eiri-san with any part of his bunny or body.

            Yuki kept his head down, securing the window seat for himself. Sakuma-san was left with the aisle as Yuki's hidden eyes stared blankly out of the window. Mechanically, he reached for a cigarette, then cursed at the polite "Thank you for not smoking" signs which adorned every free surface of the aircraft's interior. With a low growl, he replaced the cigarette and resumed his observations of the runway.

            Not to be without entertainment for a minute, Sakuma-san procured some beads from his pockets and began to make shiny bracelets for himself and Kumagorou, simply using the useless knick-knacks he found in his pockets and stringing them together upon worn pieces of string. Suddenly, he offered Eiri a bracelet of glass beads and colorful lint, whereupon he had scrawled 'Eiri-san' in huge, cursive Ryuichi letters. "I made something for you!!"

            Yuki blinked, taken aback. In that brief moment of blackness, the brown-haired head before him transformed, if only for an instant, into another smiling face, though whether its hair is pink or light blonde was difficult to determine. Yuki swallowed. He hesitated for a moment, then accepted the gift with a brief dip of his head, indicating the thanks he did not trust his voice to convey.

            Ryuichi beamed brightly, as if he had gotten exactly what he wanted for Christmas, and turned back to working with his worn wooden beads, stringing them onto a string to tie around his fuzzy friend's neck, all the while humming chords to Sleepless Beauty.

            Yuki watched for a moment, then turned to the window again. Expression carefully hidden by the glasses, he tried to shove earlier thoughts out of his mind, but they marched on regardless of his wishes. _A dark place..._ With a purely internal shiver, he closed his eyes. Bad idea. The instant reality was hidden, flashes of memory presented themselves, each demanding to be seen. _A dark place, yes; dark and dank, dingy and cold. Hard wall at his back. Grinning faces looming over him, so tall, so large... _Yuki's eyes few open again as he choked slightly, covering his mouth with his hand. As he pulled it back, he noticed a small spatter of red against his pale skin. Frown hidden by the ever-present glasses, he lowered the hand quickly to hide the evidence and stared out the window again.

            Ryuichi seemed too engrossed in his work to notice Eiri-san, but offered him a small, drink sized napkin off of the drink cart to wipe his hands off with. With a disturbing smile, he added, "Don't think yourself sick on this trip!"  and then continued humming his Sleepless Beauty to himself, again working hard on his beaded bracelets.

            Eiri scowled to himself but accepted the napkin. _At least it's not Tohma. I don't think I could take that right now._ He answered with a noncommittal "Hnh" and settled in. _It's going to be a long flight..._ ****

Somewhere in the middle of the long trip, Ryuichi got up, leaving his Kumagorou, strangely, in the aisle seat, and bounced down to the end of the plane. Eiri figured he'd be back soon enough, but twenty minutes later… still no Ryuichi. K-chan began to slump in its master's seat, feeling unloved and forgotten.

            After forty minutes or so, Eiri began to get suspicious. After a full hour, he pulled the stewardess aside as she passed with refreshments and inquired, "Pardon me... have you seen my seatmate? He left some time ago and hasn't returned."****

            The stewardess looked rather uncomfortable as she pointed down to the end of the plane. "There was a man who has locked himself in that back bathroom and refuses to get out... some of the passengers are becoming rather testy with him..." She bit her lip. "I do hope he's okay..."

            Yuki sighed. "Thank you," he replied, and strode to the end of the plane, slipping between whatever irate passengers might be present. He rapped sharply on the bathroom door, awaiting a response. He received none, save for a small sniff behind the large bathroom door.

            "Sakuma-san. Is that you?"

            Another sniff, and then a long, drawn out, "Haaaaaii....."

            "It is time to come out now."****

"....I feel sick...."

            Yuki frowned. "Do you need a doctor?"****

"....I need a janitor...."

            _Eight... nine... ten...._ Yuki tried his level best to keep from snapping. ..._eleven__... twelve...._ His voice was low and barely controlled as he addressed the other passengers. "Would one of you be so.... _kind_ as to fetch someone from Maintenance...?"

            The passengers seemed to agree with Eiri's idea, and one went to fetch a maintenance person only to come back with a poor, innocent flight attendant. "What seems to be the trouble, sir?" she asked.

            _Why me...?_ Yuki seriously considered walking away and pretending he had nothing to do with the situation. Instead, he growled, "Ask _him,_" and jerked a thumb towards the occupied bathroom. 

            The poor woman turned to stare at the door, bemused, and was greeted by a muffled sound of ruffled papers, and then a "I'm fine in here—erk—Eiri-saaan!! I have...PAPER TOWELS!!" A scrubbing noise was heard from the bathroom.

            This time, Eiri could not hide his expression, eyes squinting shut as his nose wrinkled up in distaste and annoyance. To the stewardess, he remarked, "I believe you will need someone to clean up in there." Turning on his heel, he stalked back to his seat, eyeing the placid pink bunny resentfully. _This is all **your fault.**_

            Yet another hour later, Ryuichi came back all grins, save for a slight tinge of green upon his cheeks. "I'm okay now! Did you worry about me?" He huggled Kumagorou and directed the question both to his bunny and Eiri-san.

            Yuki sighed. _Are we there yet...?_ Ryuichi spent the remainder of the flight singing random Nittle Grasper songs until it seemed that every passenger on board the aircraft must know every single word to those songs and likewise carry a deep resentment for the ecstatic singer bouncing in his seat.

            Yuki kept silent throughout the trip save for one brief incident. Ryuichi cycled through his songs pretty much randomly, but as soon as Eiri recognized the first few lines of Shining Collection, he cut the singer off. "Don't... sing that."

            A blink from Ryuichi. "Um, why...?" He trailed off, leaving the question lingering in the air like a bad aftertaste.

            Yuki's voice was strange and somewhat strained. "Just don't."****

            "Mm..." Ryuichi flopped his head over to the side, grip loosening upon his Kumagorou, then suddenly tightening again, as he seems to have bounced back from his stupor. "Okay."

            Yuki returned his gaze to the window, burying himself in private thoughts for the remainder of the flight.  
  


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sorry for the wait, folks…. hope it was worth it!

many thanks to everyone who left feedback. ^^ keep it coming! we need YOUR comments to be able to publish this stuff. ;) 

fallen if you're reading this, leave a comment in my journal or midori-chan's? you probably DID meet us both on make_me_shining (it's midori-chan's community). i was going to stalk you to your journal and leave a comment saying "thanks," but it's not in your ff.net profile, so i don't know who you are on lj. ^^;;

next chapter: arrival in london, eiri's patience requires counting to twenty-two, and we get to peek inside the mind of nittle grasper's lead vocalist. what _is his motivation? why has he dragged eiri on this quest? stay tuned!_

-vethia & midori-chan


	5. Cab Ride

**notes****: **

1. hmmm…. ok, let's take a look at this. chapter 3: cliff-hanger ending. reviews: 13. chapter 4: mostly setup/exposition. more natural chapter ending. reviews: 2.

seems to me people like a more exciting ending. i bow to the will of the majority!

2. just a reminder that this fic is CO-AUTHORED. we could only post it on one name, obviously, but midori-chan wrote ryuichi's half of this story. please be kind and head over to her profile—there's a lot of great stuff there, too!

3. no, we haven't acquired the rights to gravitation between the last chapter and this one. curses, foiled again. _

-vethia & midori-chan

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            As the two disembarked in London, Eiri spoke for the first time since his comment about the song. His tone was grudging, as if he hated—no, _loathed_ to admit his own lack of information regarding the situation, but had no other choice. "Well...?"

            "Ummm? Well?" Ryuichi tilted his head as if he has no idea what was going on.

            _Thirteen... fifteeen.... twenty-two..._ Eiri closed his eyes for a moment, trying to refrain from destroying the entire world and Ryuichi right along with it. _K-san would have some sort of tracking device to find out where that signal was from. Tohma would use his fame to get information from officials. Even Nakano-san would keep his head better than this._ "We are looking for Shuichi."

            "Ohh, Shuu-chan..." A sudden change came over Ryuichi's body. He dropped the pink bunny he was holding upon the floor and grinned coolly over at Eiri. The rabbit stared up at him with melancholy coal eyes as the man kicked it away from him under a passenger's seat—as if he were abandoning the happy side of Sakuma-san forever, and replacing him with some cheap facsimile. "Let's go, then." His grin was almost frightening.

            Eiri nodded, keeping a wary eye on... whoever-it-was he was traveling with. With a sarcastic sweep of his hand, he indicated that Ryuichi should lead the way. Ryuichi caught his hand in mid-sweep and turned his to face him, eyes dark and cloudy like the sea before a storm. "Have faith in me, hm? Don't be so cheeky, and swallow your pride once in awhile." With that, he walked down the aisle of the plane towards the exit, leaving a passenger behind Yuki calling out to him, "Uh...sir? You forgot your... rabbit..."

            Yuki snagged the bunny by a floppy pink ear but did not return it to its owner. His face assumed that blank expression that it knew so well, carefully hiding any trace of emotion from _this_ Ryuichi. Tucking the plushie under his arm for safe-keeping (as humiliating as it was to walk around with a bright pink rabbit), he followed.

            Jade sunglasses covering his eyes, Ryuichi strode out into the gate and, after waiting for Eiri to appear, he took the writer aside to stare out the window of the airport, much like he had done before. "How much of my story do you believe...?"

            Eiri crossed his arms. "I believe that Shuichi is in trouble and that you know something about it."

            Ryuichi crossed his arms as well. "What makes you think I won't tell you lies, hmmm?" He leaned closer to Eiri as he spoke.

            In a rare moment of honesty, Eiri met the man's eyes, holding his gaze steady. "If you didn't need me to find him, you would have done it yourself. Since you told me in the first place, you need something from me. And since your ultimate goal is to recover Shuichi..." He, too, leaned in close until their faces nearly touched. "...I don't care what you tell me. So shut up and lead the way." He pulled back and turned, ready to leave, then glanced back. "Oh, and you forgot this." He tossed the pink bunny at Ryuichi, who caught it reflexively.

            The young man snorted at him indifferently, staring at the plush bunny. For a moment, he seemed as if he was going to discard the rabbit in the nearby wastebasket, and he almost did—but his hand seemed to be tightly clenched about the fuzzy object. He appeared mildly irritated, and shook off his irritation with a shrug of his shoulders. "Fine."

            Yuki smiled for the first time since Sakuma-san had entered his apartment that morning, a small smirk of satisfaction. He let his gaze linger on the rabbit for a moment. _Hm__.__ So I was right after all._ The narrow-eyed smile widened slightly, but he spoke not a word, waiting for Ryuichi to either lead the way or volunteer some information.

            Ryuichi shot a sneer in Eiri's direction and began to talk, hand gripping the Kumagorou rabbit tightly. "First off, I'm sure you have no clue what it's like to have separate personalities... because you sit back and watch things happen when you don't want them to... all because of someone's stupid mistake..." He studied Eiri's face for a moment. The novelist seemed surprised by the sudden outburst, but there was something more behind his eyes. "Or perhaps you do know..."

            A muscle jumped in the Eiri's jaw. He made no reply, caught for the moment in the vision that sprung, unbidden, to his mind... the face which now hovered always under the hat, smiling with the mouth but not the eyes... In the vision, however, the face was much younger. And it wasn't smiling. Eiri gritted his teeth. "Let's go."

            "Alright alright, I was just trying to make some_ small talk..._" Ryuichi grinned as he turned on his heel and began to walk towards the terminal exit. Yuki reset his blank stare, making certain that his sunglasses were firmly in place, and followed. Uncannily, as if he'd been to this airport many times, Ryuichi made it out of the building and hailed a taxi, offering Eiri the first seat.

            Eiri might have remarked on the strange sense of familiarity if it weren't for his preoccupation. He slid into place in the taxi without a word; in fact, it was the very words which were causing him this distress. The accent was different, to be sure, but English nonetheless. Staring out of the window again, he mentally called up every old Japanese song or nursery rhyme he could remember, repeating them over and over in his head. Some small, detached and cynical part of his mind asked, _Does__ it help...?_ He considered for a moment, then answered himself. _Not really... but it's something to do._

            Ryuichi, on the other side, was staring blankly into the leaden eyes of Kumagorou, grip tightening upon the plush bunny as his mouth twisted into a menacing snarl. He whispered some dry words to the bunny, but it seemed not to hear him... it just kept smiling back at him with the same oblivious look the former Ryuichi had given the man sitting next to him only moments before.

            "Where to, guv'nor?" The driver's thick Cockney accent rang out through the car and Yuki practically jumped. He looked quickly over at his companion, narrowing his eyes as he noted the attitude of the bunny's owner. A sharp jab of his elbow would hopefully bring Ryuichi back to some semblance of—well, if not sanity, at least usefulness. In Japanese, he inquired of the singer, "Well? Where _are_ we going?" 

            Slowly, estranged sapphire eyes met Eiri's. The vocalist bared his teeth in an eerie smile. "To the London concert hall." He spoke in English, eyes still fixated on his seatmate.

            More than a little unnerved by his passengers, the taxi driver replied shortly, "Right, then..." and pulled away. Yuki's eyes narrowed as they met Sakuma-san's frustratingly knowledgeable gaze. _I know I said I didn't care as long as we find Shuichi, but you are really starting to get on my nerves,_ he thought silently. He couldn't help but feel... helpless. Like a child again. And that was _not_ a feeling that Yuki Eiri liked. Still speaking his mother tongue, he asked shortly, "Is that where he is?"

            Cold eyes shot him a look of disgust. "Did I say I knew where he was? You don't know that." His eyes narrowed as well, smile dead-set upon his face.

            Yuki's temper began to fray. "Then what the hell _do_ you know?!" He surged forward, as if ready to get the answers out of that brown-haired head once and for all, but stopped himself as abruptly as he had begun. He stole a quick glance forward at the driver. The man's wide eyes were clearly visible in the rearview mirror, though he quickly jerked them back to the road once Yuki cught him looking. The novelist sighed but lowered his voice, growling, "What _do_ you know about all this? And why didn't you tell anyone before me?"

            The vocalist grinned in return. "I told you first because you're pretty." _*The exact wrong reason, Ryuichi, you know why you told him first...* | Bakayaro. Urusai.| ~Ryuichi-kuun...I want to go home...please let me out of here...~ |No.| *Temper, temper, Ryuichi... don't treat us like that... you might snap again...*  |SHUT UP! Shut up, all of you!!!|_

            Yuki snorted. To an observer, his manner was casual, brushing the situation off without a second thought—but nothing could be further from the truth. His eyes were very carefully fixed on the man before him; watching, waiting. Cautious. _If only I knew what was going on inside that head of yours..._ "And what, _exactly_, do you know...?"

            _*Tell him, tell him why you came to his house, Ryuichi... what were you running away from when you came there?* |...Nothing..| (...Eiri-san, don't be mad at me...) *Nothing, my ass! Why was Tohma calling you...tell him...* |SHUT UP!!| (Eiri-san, help...) ~I want my Kumagorou...~_ Ryuichi shook his head fervently, breath catching in his throat, as he spoke in whimpers. "...Why... what do you want...?"

            Eiri blinked. He looked from Ryuichi to the driver and back again. _He can't understand Japanese, so I suppose it's all right..._ He spoke carefully, as if inching forward across uncertain ground—"I want to find Shuichi"—and waited to see what the man's reaction would be.

            _|Everyone wants know about Shuichi, of course...he's the star...Shuichi...| *Do I sense a bit of jealousy, here? I thought he was your best friend...* ~He is, and I'll do anything to help him, na no da!~ |He is NOT!! Not after...that...| *...that...* ~o_o Mou....but we can forgive him?~  |I CAN'T!!!! I couldn't hear ANY OF YOU before this! And now you're HERE, in my head! GET OUT!| *Your head? What the hell are you talking about? I was here first....* ~Wah, but Kumagorou...~ (....HELP ME!!!!)_

            Eiri watched as flickers of personality passed through the singer's eyes, almost too fast to register, and became increasingly alarmed. He glanced at the driver... then at Ryuichi... then back at the driver again. _Fuck._ Quickly, decisively, he reached out and took the vocalist by the shoulders, giving him a quick shake. "Sakuma-san!" _With any luck, he'll snap out of it when he hears his name..._

            "_GET AWAY FROM ME!!!_" The chocolate-haired boy screamed, kicking Eiri away from him and smashing his shoulder into the taxicab's door. The door swung open with a harsh 'clack,' sending the singer tumbling out into the streets. Not to be hindered by a few lesions and perhaps a broken wrist, he scrambled to his feet and bolted straight into the streets of London.

            Yuki cursed loudly as the driver exclaimed and slammed on the breaks, bringing the cab to a screeching halt. The writer scrambled out of the car, throwing a wad of euros at the driver as he did so—more than enough to cover the ride and hopefully enough to keep the man quiet, too. Slipping slightly on the wet cement, Yuki pelted after his only link to Shuichi. _Damn it... dark sunglasses really don't help when it's raining and you're trying to catch up to someone. On foot. In __London__.__ DAMN IT!_ Unfortunately, if he took the time to pull them off, he would undoubtedly lose sight of the lithe man running away from him. Shooting past some very startled Britons, he snarled at the necessity of being noticed. _When I catch up to you, you bastard, someone is going to pay—whatever it is that made you so damned crazy. _A note of bitterness entered his internal monologue. _Probably Tohma.__ Oh, he and I will have a chat when I get home, that's for sure..._

_            *Sure, running away from him will help, that always helps...* ~Maa, Ryuichi-kun, you're getting Kumagorou wet!!!~ |I'm not crazy...I'm not crazy...I'm not a freak...I'm not crazy....| _Breath ragged, the man threw his lithe body onward, the rain pelting against him and permeating his skin with its dark liquid tears. His eyes mirrored the grey sky above as he shook his head in frustration, trying to distinguish a single train of thought from the many voices that were masquerading about as himself inside his own head. He ran on as his calves begin to burn—a trivial pain compared to the hurt circulating around his brain.

            Yuki sprinted after the other man, cursing mentally with each breath. He scrambled around corners and through puddles, following his quarry and gaining slowly but steadily as they wound their way through the London alleyways. At last, he managed to get close enough to catch the Ryuichi's arm, pulling him backwards to stop his momentum and then pushing him against the wall. Panting slightly, Yuki scowled down with a mixture of anger and concern, arms pressed against the wall on either side of the singer to form a sort of cage. Hesitant to touch his companion a second time, he could think of nothing to do except call the singer's name again. "Sa— " he began, then changed his mind. "Ryuichi! Calm down!"

            Ryuichi stared at him in shock for a moment, eyes paling from a grey color to a dull white in the dim light of the alleyway. Suddenly he grabbed the front of Eiri's shirt and burst into a torrent of unexpected tears. He pressed the fabric of Eiri's shirt to his forehead along with the soaking wet Kumagorou, sinking to his knees in a fit of sobs. _*...go away...* |Get out of my head...| ~Why can't we be friends...?~_

            This took Eiri completely by surprise. He stumbled as Ryuichi fell to the ground, pulled down by virtue of the hand still clinging to his shirt. Blinking the rain away, he tried to call up some emotion, some sort of deep caring or concern to add to the feeble gift of his body, kneeling in a dirty puddle. His hands hung at his sides, cuffs trailing in the muddy water, as his eyes stared at the alleyway over the shaking form before him. _All cities... really look the same, when you get right down to it. __Tokyo__, __Kyoto__, __London__, __Berlin__...__New York__..._ He shivered slightly, one hand raising mechanically to wrap around Ryuichi's shaking back, in an unconscious (subconscious?) imitation of Tohma so many years ago. _It's hard to remember that Sakuma-san is older than me..._ Yuki stared blankly, eyes darkening to amber-green as he silently held his companion.

            "Get them out of my head, Eiri-san...why are they there...I...I d-don't want them there..." The boy stammered, gripping Eiri's shirt, and sobbed into the already drenched cloth. The pain began to bore into his head like a drill and he started to cry louder, as a young child would if they were being hurt by someone they loved. He wanted to say something to Eiri, to give him some word of information to be helpful, but the only sound his throat would produce was more sobs.

            Eiri froze. _My God... he wants me to... he's asking if I will..._ It all made a sickening amount of sense. He dragged his eyes back from the alley, resting them at last on the trembling boy, expression resembling nothing more than the classic 'deer in the headlights.' _Why me? Why did he come to me? I can't even fix my own damned mind.... why does he think I can help him? I can't help him... I can't help anyone... anyone I care for just ends up getting hurt. Hurt or **dead.**_ _He can't expect me to help him. He just can't._ Yuki's voice was strangely distant as he retreated behind his masks, desperate to deny his fear and insecurity. "I... don't know how."

            Tighter still the hand clamped around his shirt. "Of course you do...Eiri-san...you can help...I know you can...I...I..." Ryuichi buried his head farther into Eiri's shirt. "I believe in you...please, Eiri-san...make them go away."

            _He... believes in me? No... that's not right. Nobody should believe in me. I... I only hurt the ones I touch... _Despite his frantic train of thought, Yuki's other hand reached up almost mechanically to join the first in its careful embrace, still dripping with muddy water. Sure, he had a nasty exterior, and most people thought him a dick, but it would take a much colder man than Eiri to refuse a plea like that. "Sakuma-san," he started, slowly, hoping that continuing to use a name would keep Ryuichi 'there,' so to speak. "Tell me... how they got there, and then maybe I can help."

            The cries began to subside and the vocalist gained his voice, scratchy from tears and muffled in the other man's shirt. "...It's true, about the lyrics. I _was_ jealous, and everyone else was acting like it was perfectly normal for them to ignore me and still have Shuu-chan write his own lyrics...and...and..." Tighter, tighter, the hand wound the fabric into its shaking fingers. "Shuu-chan had his own lyrics for his single—and I was so angry. I didn't want to be made famous off of someone else's brainpower. I wanted to be like Shuichi, and write my own songs...and I thought...I thought...if his song were gone, I could still be at the top with NG, and maybe Tohma would let me have my own lyrics back. So I found the lyrics to that new song...and tore them up. I don't know now why I did it, I just did..." He paused for a slow breath. "Shuichi saw me though, and I.... I don't know what I did, I just woke up in the hospital the next day dressed all in white. And I stayed there...and stayed there...and no one came to help me...no one came...I stayed there...and they..." He paused again, then finished in a soft voice. "...things..."

            Yuki's eyes, wide at the outset, slowly narrowed as the story was laid before him. His voice was still quiet when, at last, he spoke. "Things...?"

            "They told me there was something wrong with me. They hooked me up to things, and they..." He bit back a sob harshly. "There's nothing wrong with me." He brought his pathetic-looking face, soaking wet, cheeks concave and eerily unsmiling, up to stare at the novelist. Melancholy grey eyes penetrated Eiri-san's soul. "...is there?"

            Eiri swallows but did not answer. _I can understand his jealousy. It's natural, of course. Why Tohma didn't tell me about this 'plan' of his, I'll never know... but it must have upset Sakuma-san more than he knew. I should tell Sakuma-san that it's all right. I should... but... _But what about Shuichi? Eiri stared at the wall without seeing it, eyes outwardly empty, but guarded. _He still hasn't told me what happened to Shuichi. _Arms still loosely holding the musician, Eiri could only ask, "Who else knows about this?"

            The face buried itself into Eiri's shirt again. The vocalist lifted up his broken wrist, which was jutting out slightly at an obtuse angle, and pointed to his head. "_They_ know."

            Eiri hissed in surprise as he noticed the broken bone for the first time. Without further conversation, he gathered the boy into his surprisingly strong arms and stood up. "I'm taking you to a doctor. When the doctors fix your body, I will help you with... _them_." He skirted the issue with words, reluctant to refer to Ryuichi's 'voices' by any other name.

            As soon as Eiri mentioned the word 'doctor', the singer convulsed and clung to his chest, trembling violently. "Don't take me there...they're going to hurt me...they're going to kill me..." He began to cry again, this time softer, wails muffled by the dripping Kumagorou pressed to his face.

            Eiri's tone was one which brooked no argument; when he spoke with conviction, one could not help but believe him. "I will _not_ let them hurt you. They will fix your wrist and then we will leave. It will be all right." _I hope it will, anyway..._ With a purely internal shiver, Yuki shoved at the memories which seemed to be flooding back with all their remembered force. He knew he wouldn't be able to hold them back much longer—not with this broken, crying boy who had placed himself in Yuki's hands. _Why did you choose me? I can't even help myself..._ The prescription bottle he kept in his jacket at all times was pressing against his chest, its presence made evident by the boy he was holding. If only he could get Sakuma-san somewhere safe, he could take one of those little pills, and the memories... well, they wouldn't go away, but maybe they would fade enough for him to _do_ something. 

            The singer slowly acquiesced, holding his K-chan to his heart like a lifeline, and became eerily silent. The only sound was the pattering of the rain, smudging out his quiet breaths with its endless din. "Promise...?" He smiled weakly up at his saviour, the word almost inaudible through the falling rain.

            _All of your promises are lies. You only hurt the ones you love. You swore never to care again... lies... lies... lies..._ "...I promise."

            " 'Kay." His body became lax and somewhat of a deadweight as he snuggled his wet bunny and stared blankly up into the grey, churning source of the rain. His facial expression was somewhere between awe of the rain and somewhat of a traumatic stupor as his pink-rabbit friend gazed up at Eiri with questioning eyes.

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…ok, so i couldn't exactly manage a cliff-hanger, but i _did let this chapter run to almost double-length. i hope this one gets a little better reception than the last… _ lack of reviews makes midori-chan cry. and anyone who makes midori-chan cry will have to answer to __me.*cracks knuckles* so please, tell us what you think!_

next chapter: how will ryuichi react to the hospital? will eiri be able to keep anyone from discovering his own weakness? another gravitation character makes an appearance as more complexities emerge. stay tuned!

-vethia & midori-chan


	6. Hospital

**disclaimer:** gravitation is not, never was, and never will be mine; nor is it midori-chan's, sad to say. i weep.

**note:** the third gravitation character appearing in this chapter was written by midori-chan as well. show her some love. :)

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            Eiri set his jaw firmly and headed back out to the main streets, boy and bunny cradled carefully in his arms. When he reached a populated area once again, one arm disengaged just long enough to hail a cab. Upon entering, he directed the driver with the first use of English since his arrival in London: "Take me to the nearest hospital." The cabbie eyed Ryuichi, then nodded smartly and headed off. Eiri stared out the window in silence, reluctant to look at the broken man in his arms. 

            _*See, and this is what you get for telling him. A person to pity you. Oh, pooor Saaakumaaa-saaan...you poor thing...right...* |Peh, you don't deserve the pity. Like you were a victim. He only told the truth.| (But...but I'm normal....really... *sob*) |Quit crying, you selfish bastard. You deserve all of what was coming to you.| (I'm innocent...really...) *...as innocent as an asassin...* (...Eiri-san said....) *When did he ever say you were normal? He just changed the subject.* |That's right...| (...please don't do this to me...)_

            After driving in silence for a few moments, Eiri stole a glance at the man in his arms. _Why did he come to me? I wonder why he didn't go to Ukai-san or Tohma... Well, I suppose it's a good thing he didn't go to Tohma, but still._ Reluctantly, he tore his eyes away as the cab pulled to a stop. 

            "That'll be seventeen, sir..." 

            Eiri cut the man off by handing him a wad of money which, while probably much more than required, had the advantage of not having to be counted. "Thanks," he muttered, and got out of the cab, heading for the emergency room. It was not long at all before he bore Ryuichi through the sliding glass doors and settled down to wait.

            _*Nyah ha ha ha....Sakuma-san's going insaaaneee... he's going to hurt Yuuuuki like he did Shuu-chan.....* (I...I didn't hurt him...) *Of course you did! Why do you think Shuu's arm was bleeding? Why do you think you were the one holding the knife? And now you're distracting Yuki while Shuichi could be getting raped or killed? Tch, tch....you bastard...*_ (I DIDN'T DO IT!!!) Ryuichi let out a small whimper and clasped his hand around Eiri's shirt again. "Stop it..."

            Yuki's eyes focused reluctantly, dragging themselves away from their blank stare and settling on Ryuichi with detached concern, if there is such a thing. "Stop what...? Sakuma-san, are you all right?"

            "No...no, I'm fine." He smiled. "I'm perfectly fine." _|That's right, Sakuma-san--don't tell--...| *We won't tell if you won't...* ~That you're cwazy~~! Kee hee hee hee! ~_

            Eiri's eyes narrowed, but he responded only with a grunt of assent, eyes turning back to the wall once again. _Damn it all... this is so frustrating! I _know_ he's hiding things from me, and he still hasn't said a word about Shuichi... but how can I confront him about it? It'll only make things worse._ One hand reached up absently to wipe sweat off of his brow, though that had become so commonplace that Yuki didn't even notice the habitual action. 

            Moments later, a nurse was with them, and Yuki explained in heavily accented English that his friend had slipped and fallen in the rain. The nurse shook her head in sympathy and told them that the doctor would be with them shortly. 

            Moments later, a man stepped out and called, "Ryuichi Sakuma...?" He mispronounced the name horribly, of course, and Yuki muttered the correction under his breath while carefully placing Ryuichi on his feet. "They're going to take care of your arm, and then we will... fix things," he told his companion in a low voice.

            Ryuichi bit the nails on his broken hand while coddling Kumagorou with the other. "...And you're not coming with me?" he asked in a childish tone, as a young kid would ask its mother permission to do something.

            Yuki frowned slightly at the action and replied, as if distracted, "...Should I?" While speaking, his hand was drawn subconsciously to his jacket pocket, fingering the medication which would push the memories away, if only for a moment... if only he could get a chance to _take_ it. Not that he'd ever let Ryuichi see _that._

            "Mm…" The vocalist looked over uneasily at the doctor, then at Eiri's hand in his pocket, as if something the novelist had done clicked in Ryuichi's muddled mind. "No, I'm okay..." Another inane smile and he started towards the doctor tenaciously.

            Yuki looked after him until he was out of sight then glided over to the nurse to make payment arrangements. As soon as the business was settled (money might not be able to buy him happiness, but it still made trips to London less of a hassle), he asked to be shown the washroom. Once inside, he placed his hands on either side of the sink, leaning over it with a shudder as his masks crumbled to dust. He wiped sweat from his forehead again, fumbling for the medicine bottle. 

            Eiri swallowed the pills without water and stared at his face in the mirror, waiting for the drugs to take effect. Even he had to admit that he looked like death—pale and drawn, empty eyes gazing hollowly back at him from the glass. _Where are you, Shuichi...?_ he caught himself thinking. Images flooded his mind and he gasped, squeezing his eyes shut as he leaned against the sink for support. Eventually, the deluge subsided, and he steadied himself. After a few minutes, he was able to walk out and resume his place in the waiting room.

            Meanwhile, Ryuichi was regarding the doctor suspiciously as the man eyed the broken wrist and lesions upon the boy's body. "Must have been an awful fall, hm?" The doctor tried to lighten the dark mood of the room with light, British conversation, but Ryuichi kept his dead sapphire eyes fixed on his, slashing any further words the doctor was going to say to his unwilling patient. 

            Giving up on communication, the doctor grasped the singer's wrist in his hand and carefully wrenched the bone back into place. Ryuichi yelped, glared at him moodily, and tried to snatch his hand away, but he was restrained by the sheer force of the doctor's grip. Suddenly frightened again, he smacked the doctor away with his good hand and propelled himself—right out the window of the two-story building. He slammed into the nearby bushes with a snap and, registering something else was broken but not really caring, he fled the hospital as fast as his poor legs could take him. The voices cackled in malignant whispers in his head as his body, covered in cuts and bruises, as he ran to the only place he can think of for safety—The London Concert Hall.

            Slumped in the waiting room, head cradled in his hand, Yuki heard the exclamations of surprise and concern from behind the door. He barely had time to narrow his eyes and look up before one of the nurses burst out into the room, babbling something about "Mr. Sakuma... the window..." Cursing profusely in as many languages as he can think of (though notably _not_ in English), Yuki jumped to his feet and sprinted out of the hospital before the security guards could stop him. Once there, the commotion in Ryuichi's wake set him on the right track and he started to run as fast as he could. _Shit... shit... shit! I shouldn't have left him alone..._

            Coming to a busy intersection, he lost the trail and had no choice but to grab a man roughly by the arm and gasp out, "A man... running... which way did he go?" The Englishman was too startled by his presence and appearance to do anything more than point, and as Yuki ran, geography suddenly clicked into place. _The concert hall... that's it, over there. He wanted me to go there before--maybe he's there now. _Eiri dashed through the crowd, barely managing to avoid slipping on the wet pavement, and finally threw open the door of his destination. 

            He was greeted by the sight of Tohma backing Ryuichi into a far corner of the stage, hands pressed against the sides of Ryuichi's shoulders and pinning him to the wall, as the vocalist stared wide into his bandmate's eyes. Tohma was whispering something close into Ryuichi's ear—it seemed rather _too close for the singer's liking. Ryuichi's face drained and he slumped against the wall, leaving Tohma to keep whispering in his ear._

            Yuki blinked, stumbling a little as he came to an abrupt halt just inside the doorway. This was definitely the _last_ thing he expected to see. "T-toh..." he gasped out, but further speech was arrested as the novelist suddenly doubled over in pain, coughing loudly. His hands flew to his mouth as he reeled backwards, suddenly dizzy, and flecks of blood sprayed the floor.

            "EIRI-SAN!!" Ryuichi screamed jerking forward, but he was quickly caught in the hands of Tohma, who restrained the broken boy with his hands and stared at the novelist with ice cool eyes. "...Eiri-san."

            Eiri could make no reply, though he dearly wished to. He could only stare at the other blonde with wide, pain-filled eyes, a mixture of hurt and betrayal that hadn't been seen on this face in quite some time. When last it was, though... Tohma was there. Eiri fell to his knees, one hand outstretched to steady his shaking body against the floor, the other still clasped across his mouth as he spat blood, unable to stop the coughing fit.

            Tohma made his way towards Yuki, turquoise eyes burning, leading Ryuichi by a gloved hand strongly gripped around his broken wrist. When the two reached Eiri, the vocalist dropped to his knees in an attempt to pull himself away from Tohma. "Eiri-san..." He barely touched a golden thread of the novelist's hair before Tohma jerked his broken wrist backwards. "Get away from him." The words were cold, harsh, and biting to Ryuichi. He mashed his petal lips together and fell back away from the two, eyes glittering fiercely with unshed tears. 

            Tohma knelt down and embraced the coughing man in his lithe arms, whispering softly, "It's okay, Eiri-san..." Eiri jerked backwards, away from the older man, struggling to control the spasms of his body. Narrowed eyes glittered with emotion (though _which_ emotion was entirely unclear) and he spat out words along with the blood. "What... the _hell_... is going on here?!"

            Tohma appeared rather surprised... although with Tohma, no emotion was certain. "...Um? Going on?" Behind the calm record producer Ryuichi was toppling over himself scrambling backwards, panting heavily through his half-open mouth.

            Eiri's temper finally snapped. Stress, worry, surprise, confusion, and a healthy dose of resurfacing memories combined to crack his cold exterior, if only for a moment. "Yes, going on! What are _you_ doing here, and with Sakuma-san... and where the HELL is Shuichi?!?" Blood sprayed from his mouth in tiny droplets as he spoke, but the worst convulsions seemed to have subsided.

            Ryuichi reached a hand out, trying desperately to calm the dry hiccups heaving from his chest and also trying to assuage Eiri in some way. "We don't know, Eiri-san..." Tohma shot a glare at him, and Ryuichi immediately retracted his hand and scrambled farther into the darkness.

            Eiri looked from one man to the other and back again, calming slightly as he regained control of his body. His eyes glanced momentarily in the direction of a forgotten pink bundle, abandoned in a filthy puddle, and a slight frown drifted across his face before the controlled anger resumed its place. His voice, when he spoke, was low and measured, the calmness an unsettling contrast to his coldly sparkling eyes. "All right. Enough of these games. One of you tell me _everything_ that is going on, from the beginning. I don't care who."

            Ryuichi opened his mouth, yet Tohma's voice emerged from the silence. "Sakuma-san nearly _killed_ Shuichi. He was put in a mental hospital for two months, but then mysteriously disappeared. As soon as I heard about it, I called Ryuichi on the only place I knew where to call..." He shot a glance at the trembling boy. "_On his cell._"

*     *     *     *     *

            _"Sakuma-san?!?!" Tohma couldn't believe Ryuichi had actually picked up._

_            "Ano....Seguchi-san..."_

_            The NG producer cut his bandmate off, snapping into the phone, "Where the HELL are you?! You're not in the institution???"_

_            Ryuichi's words came slowly, almost haltingly, with no connection whatsoever to Tohma's question. "Hi...how are you? F-fine...? Good, that's good to know..."_

_             Tohma blinked. "What...the hell...Ryuichi....?"_

_            "Where...where am I?"_

_            The singer took the words right out of his mouth. "That's right, where are you? You need to come back here, and get treatment. You're mentally unstable."_

_            "I'm going out!" _

_            "No, you are certainly NOT going out!!! Get back here this instant, goddamnit!! You're going to HURT someone!"_

_            Ryuichi's voice trembled only slightly. "Where…?" It was like they were having two different conversations. "Out...with Kumagorou!" _

_            "GODDAMNIT, RYUICHI!!! WHERE ARE YOU??!?!?"_

_            "Alright, I won't be out too late...heh..."_

_            "Where ar—"_

_            "Sankyuu, Seguchi-san." _

_            Click._

*     *     *     *     *

            _I should have known. I should have known better than to trust him, even then… I should have known better than to trust anyone. But it's too late now. Eiri's coldly blazing eyes turned to Ryuichi, but when he spoke, it was directed at Tohma. "How is it that Shuichi's _condition_ is known but his _location_ is not? If he were nearly killed, I find it doubtful that he would be able to escape you. Therefore you must know where he is. Something doesn't add up." Sakuma-san inhaled sharply when Eiri's eyes met his, and quickly exhaled in a hacking, sickly cough that died out suddenly as Tohma hit him with a glare. Eiri's eyes flickered to the pink bunny once more, but they returned to Sakuma-san so quickly that one might wonder if he really looked away at all._

            The producer answered Eiri's thinly-veiled accusation. "I had no idea Shuichi was missing. I only came here to find Sakuma-san—I just learned about this."

            Eiri nodded. _Figures this would be the one time he doesn't know everything._ His tone shifted, words focusing in the same direction as his unwavering gaze. "Why did you come to London, Sakuma-san? And why did you bring me?"

            "...B-because....because..." Ryuichi's eyes flickered frightfully from blonde to blonde as a tear caressed his trembling cheeks. "I thought… Eiri-san would understand... that Eiri-san would help Sakuma-san..."

            Could that be... _compassion_ in the tired, gold-green eyes? Was there a hint of concern? Did his brows dip in just the slightest frown? "Why did you run from the doctors, Ryuichi? They were only going to fix your wrist." For the moment, he was completely ignoring Seguchi Tohma. Shuichi was still prominent in his thoughts, but something told him that the key to finding Shuu-chan was in the poor, broken mind of the 'boy' before him. And then there _was_ that bit of compassion... though Yuki would undoubtedly deny it to his dying day.

            "I...he...he hurt me..." Ryuichi tucked his legs up underneath his arms, rocking himself back and forth; a solitary, comforting motion. "He hurt me." A cough, as the vocalist's hands flew to his ribcage. "Mmmhh... it hurts..."

            Yuki sighed, seeming to deflate as his head sank into his hand. _I thought I left things like this behind me. I thought I could finally live my life without... things... like this. I'm so tired. So... tired..._ Resuming his blank demeanor with an effort, he stood, walked over, and gathered Sakuma-san into his arms, picking up the plushie as well. He turned to face Tohma. "I will handle this. Go home, Tohma." Carefully, he placed the much-abused bunny in Ryuichi's arms and turned towards the door.

            "Demo... Eiri-san..." Tohma raised a hand to object, but was silenced by something inside his head clicking to the situation at hand. His hand fell placidly to his side and he stood up, dusting off his stylish black velvet pants. "Fine. But..." He turned his gaze to Ryuichi, nestled in Eiri's arms. "If he tries to hurt anyone again, he's going straight back to that mental hospital where he can get some _real_ treatment. Understood?"

            The writer looked impassive as ever, but his tone was one of controlled anger—though the emotion was not directed at Tohma or, indeed, anyone in the room, save possibly Eiri himself. "Don't worry. He _won't_ be hurting anyone." It's not a promise. It's a threat.

            "Hn." Tohma brushed his hair behind his ear, muttering something under his breath about how he wished _he_ was mentally fucked up so that Eiri-san would carry him in his arms. _You may think you know what you're doing, but I'm not going to stop protecting you. I failed once; it won't happen again._ With this final thought he turned on his heel and left the two together, eyes swirling with some enigmatic emotion scientists have yet to classify. 

            Ryuichi's bony fingers, caged with a plethora of rings, wrapped themselves about his dear, abused, plush bunny. He grinned serenely up at Eiri, lashes shadowing bright, hurting sapphire eyes. "Sankyuu, Eiri-san."

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at long, long last… chapter 6!! rejoice! rejoice for the new chapter, for the end of my finals, and for all-around goodness. you know you want to. ^______________^ sorry this one took so long, but the aforementioned finals were eating my soul. x.x  future updates ought to be completed with alacrity.

next chapter: the hospital strikes again, our intrepid heroes (antiheroes…?) have a little discussion, and one of ryuichi's voices reveals a secret that will shock both eiri and himself… stay tuned!

once again, a million thanks go out to everyone who has reviewed the story so far. mad props to ayako for reviewing _every chapter!_ we love you. all of you. you rule. keep it coming!

-vethia & midori-chan


	7. Riddle

**note: gravitation rights: still not ours. we weep. ;_;**

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            Yuki looked after Tohma for only a moment before walking out into the rain again, carefully balancing his burden. It was a long, slow walk back to the hospital, but once there, a few euros in the right places convinced the staff that the earlier incident had never occurred. Having smoothed things out (without, it may be noted, putting Sakuma-san down even once), Yuki carried the boy back into the doctor's office; this time, he was determined to see things set to rights.

            The singer's body tensed as his nostrils caught the scent of the hospital—death, decay, hopelessness, and pain. It reminded him of silence. Terrible, horrible silence. No music at all. Music was his saviour—the angel that drove out his thoughts and voices and made him feel, if only for a little while, that he was totally together... totally collected. But now—now all he could hear was silence. He twisted his body obtusely in Eiri's arms and glanced about the room before another sharp pain drove him back to cling to his K-chan and the blonde-haired novelist.

            "Shhh... it's all right, Sakuma-san. We will be finished soon." Eiri lowered his voice and instructed the doctor. "Be as quick as you can." The doctor took a cursory scan of the young boy, nodded curtly, and motioned towards a table in the office. "Would you please leave the room?' Ryuichi's eyes widened and he shook his head profusely, clinging closer to Eiri. The novelist glanced down at the agitated Ryuichi. "I don't think that would be a good idea."

            "Right, then." The doctor breathed the last word out in an exasperated sigh. He directed the singer down to the bed and carefully lifted his shirt. The right side of his chest was covered in an ugly mess of black, green, and blue, dissolving into a patchwork quilt of bruises and cuts from the bushes. Absentmindedly, the doctor raised a questioning eyebrow at Eiri, but decided against his intended query when his eyes met the writer's cold stare. Eiri's expression very clearly said, _Don't ask. Just fix it._ Emotion flickered behind his eyes, but to someone who did not know him well, it would be impossible to determine what he is thinking… and, after all, who _did_ know Yuki well....?

            Closing his mouth with a snap, the doctor began to clean the cuts. Ryuichi locked eyes with Eiri, trying to distort his clear vision of pain by looking at someone other than the doctor tending his wounds. Eiri, for his part, met the boy's gaze. He knew that he must, but found it a strain nonetheless. It was seldom that he met anyone's eyes, but for some reason, this one was harder than most. 

            It seemed an eternity before the doctor finished, but as soon as he was through, Eiri scooped Ryuichi back up into his arms again. With a few short words and the exchange of a bit of money, he satisfied the hospital staff and carried the now-bandaged singer out into London once more. "Can you walk?" was the first thing he said that was directed solely at Ryuichi.

            "Ano..." Ryuichi glanced down at the ground, then back up at Eiri, as if he were deciding which place was better—on his feet, or in Eiri's arms. He stepped timidly to the ground, swallowing his Adam's apple down into his stomach, and pressed his feet to the pavement. He took a moment to steady himself against Eiri's shoulders and grinned, pleased with his ability to stay upright. 

            Unfortunately, the glee didn't last for long—once he let go, Ryuichi's legs seemed to crumple up like wet paper below him, and he slid downward. His grin disintegrated into a sudden expression of, _'hey, legs aren't supposed to do that...'_ as he fell. Eiri caught the boy as he slumped, gathering him carefully up into his arms again. "Guess not." 

            Once Ryuichi was settled again, Eiri began to walk, neither knowing or caring which direction he was headed. His voice was soft and low, but there was a sense of urgency underneath. "Sakuma-san... you must tell me. I need to know how to find Shuichi." He hesitated slightly, then added, "I think that it will help you, too."

            The vocalist took in a breath of the foggy London air and stared up into the sky—almost disturbingly like the time he snapped—and sighed. His eyes faded away into a sort of enveloping lassitude covering his face and body. "Okay."

            Somehow, Yuki found his way to a small park set in the middle of the city. The streetlamps flickered above them as they moved. The sky was just beginning to darken when Yuki found a bench to sit Ryuichi down on. Once the injured man was settled, he sat down himself, staring out at the fog as he lit a much-needed cigarette. Smoke wreathed about him in silence as he waited for Ryuichi's story—hopefully _this_ time, it would be something that was at least approaching the truth. The singer took a deep breath, then slowly began to speak.

            "I can't..." He paused, then added, "_We_ can't remember everything that happened. Someone told me that Shuichi had been moved to a hospital in Europe—I can't even remember which one—but somehow, I figured he'd keep the tour dates the same, even with what had happened. His music means everything to him, na no da. Well..." He tore a glance at Eiri. "Everything and _you_..."

            "He was supposed to play here? In London, at that concert hall...?"

            "Mmm hmm."

            "But he wasn't there, was he." It was not a question.

            Ryuichi tilted his head to the side, as if confirming what Eiri had said. "I thought that... since this was his last concert before arriving back in Japan..." The words trailed off, vanishing into the foggy air.

            For a moment, it seemed as if Eiri would simply refuse to answer. He stared out into the distance, smoke wreathing around his head, cigarette held loosely in his lips—but he said not a word. As the silence lengthened, a strange glitter appeared in his eyes, sparkling dully in the pale moonlight. 

            Like the feather of a fallen angel, the cigarette slipped from Eiri's lips and drifted to the ground. As if following it down, the novelist slumped on the bench and put his head in his hands, looking utterly spent.

            "Eiri... san?" Ryuichi carefully placed an arm around his shoulder, praying that Eiri wouldn't hit him away as he had Tohma. Though he did not answer, neither did Eiri shrink away from the touch. His shoulders shook, ever-so-slightly, but the movement was gone so quickly that it was difficult to register. 

            Slowly, he sat up again, face somehow blank and distant at the same time. "We should return to the concert hall. It is the only link we have. Perhaps without Tohma's interference..." He trailed off, then suddenly looked over at the singer. "How _did_ Tohma know you were coming to London, Sakuma-san?"

            "_That..._" he breathed out the words calmly, "I do not know, either. I had just come into the concert hall when he caught me."

            "Hnh." Yuki eyed his companion measuringly for a moment, then stood and scooped him up without ceremony. Carrying Sakuma-san, he headed in the direction of the theater once again. _It seems inane… but I have to do something. I can't just sit here. Maybe we will be able to find some sort of clue._

            Ryuichi eyed the road in front of him curiously, half-listening as his voices began to babble aimlessly in his head. _|What did Shuu-chan say in that text message a while back?| *Pffh, you should know, you have the best memory out of all of us...* ~Na, minna-san... Shuu-chan's not in the concert hall...~  |What?| (Ano...where is he...?) ~Himitsuuuuu! It's a secret.~ _Ryuichi made an irritated noise, trying to get some information from his voices who obviously knew more about the situation than _he_ did.

            Yuki looked down. "What's wrong?" He spoke almost grudgingly, though the reason was impossible to fathom. Maybe he was annoyed at some inner train of thought. Maybe Ryuichi's noise had interrupted something he was musing about. Then again, maybe the stress was getting to him... or he could just be his normal, stand-offish self.

            "They—them, they're not telling me something." The singer fumbled with his words as he listened on to the broken conversation between voices. _|Ryuichi-kun. You might as well tell Sakuma-san. He's going to find out sooner or later, and then tell Eiri-san.| ~ But if he doesn't know, we can stay with Eiri-san!~ (...what...what are you implying?! Can't you see he's suffering?) ~I love Eiri-san.~ |WHAT?!| *Nani??* (...oh no...)_

            Oblivious to the internal revelation, Eiri stopped, peering down at Sakuma-san with concern. "What is it...? Is it about Shuichi?"

            "Ohh no..." Ryuichi clasped his hands to his face. "This is... was... unexpected."

            Yuki frowned, confused. "Are you all right...?"

            "Yes...yes, I'm fine." _*Seeing that a part of you is in frickin' love with him makes things fine, huh?!* |That and, this lovestruck baka won't tell us what he knows about Shuu-chan... | ~ Kiiiireeii desuu....Eiri's just so pretty!! Ryuichi, kiss him for meeee!!~_ The physical Ryuichi clapped another hand to his face. "Uuughhh."

            "Hnh." Eiri looked up and began walking again, still headed for the concert hall. Off-handedly, he added, "Don't lose consciousness. Dead weight is annoying to carry."

            _~ WAAAAHHH! ~ (oh...for the love of...) |Jesus Christ.... Tatsuha's going to be pissed when he hears **this** one...| (Stop talking, and start giving me some answers! What did the text message say?) ~ I L-O-V-E E-I-R-I--- ~ *Somebody, please, kill him.*_  

            Without another reason to speak, Eiri continued on, eventually reaching the concert hall. By this time the sun had set, and the place looked a great deal different than it had in the light of day. Carefully disengaging one arm from Sakuma-san, Yuki pushed open the door and stepped inside. 

            "Wa-wait." Ryuichi stopped him before he could push the door open fully. "He's not in there." Yuki stopped short and glared down at his burden. "Oh, he isn't, is he? All right. That's _it._" With a low growl, he plopped Ryuichi down on the floor, backing the boy up against a wall. "_No. More. Lies._" His eyes sparkled and burned like frozen fire, catching and holding anything in their path. "If you know where Shuichi is, tell me _now._ No more games. Someone's _life _is on the line here." 

            Eiri took a step forward, lips tracing a path upwards to form a mirthless smile. "Do you know what a life _is,_ Sakuma-san? Do you really understand? Take a moment to think. A _life._" He took another step. "Can you feel that life in your hands? Can you feel the heartbeat, the mind, the flow of blood through veins that represents another fragile thread of human existence?" Another step. "_You_ are responsible for that life now." Another. "Can you live with that responsibility, Ryuichi Sakuma? Can you really play your little games when something of _that_ importance is under your control?" His face was mere inches from the singer's. "_Can_ you?" The glittering gold-green eyes suggested that their master knew this subject far more intimately than any simple novelist should.

            "I… I don't..." Ryuichi's eyes glazed over in fear. He pressed his back against the wall, damning his voices ten times over in his head. "I don't know. I DON'T KNOW!!!" He pointed to his head, tears starting to form in his eyes. "THEY do, I DON'T!! How... how am I supposed to get any information from some... _thing_ in my head that is obviously, definitely, and totally IN LOVE WITH YOU?!?!?" He stopped short, breath catching in his throat. 

            _He… wha? Caught completely off-guard, Eiri stepped back, eyes widening in shock. The glimpse of—whatever-it-was—in his eyes faded as quickly as it had appeared. He blinked, finding that for once, he was completely at a loss for words. _

            For a long time, Ryuichi just stared, crystal eyes wide with shock at the words that had just slipped out. Finally, he slumped farther down on the wall, letting out a waterlogged sigh. "I know that Shuichi's in trouble... and I don't want him to be in trouble..." 

            "Sakuma-san..." Eiri looked at him with more frankness than, perhaps, ever before. "If that is true, then you _must_ talk to... them. You are the only one who can. I need to know where Shuichi is so that I can help him." 

            Ryuichi nodded slightly and pressed his hands to his ears. _(No more games! Tell me where Shuichi is, NOW!!)_ There was a moment of silence, then Ryuichi looked up at Eiri-san, one of his voices beaming through his normal personality. "Uwah, Eiri-san, I'll tell you a riddle, mmkay? If you get it right... you'll find Shuichi~~!" 

            Eiri's eyes narrowed—he could recognize a personality shift when he saw one. Guarded again, he replied, "...Tell me."

            "What exists but is not there—where would you go to find such a thing? Lots of people have it, it comes in different shapes and sizes, and only one person here won't give it up~" he quipped in a sing-songy voice, grinning chastely up at Eiri. "Sooo~~, do I get a kiss now?" Eiri rolled his eyes and turned away, pacing and agitated. 

            _Damn it, I _hate_ riddles. _He was starting to sweat again—he could feel it. Annoyed, he wiped his forehead. _'One person here,' huh? I wonder if he means one of the two of us, one person in __London__, or one person in the whole damn world...? And how the _hell_ is this supposed to lead me to Shuichi?!_ Ryuichi held his head as he returned to psuedo-normal, thoughts trailing through what had just been said, mind blank....why didn't his voices just tell him directly what was going on?!

            Staring at the cold, uncaring wall, Eiri nearly despaired. _Damn it!! Words are my life, my profession... but I can't make _these_ words tell me what I need to know. Shuichi could end up hurt or worse, and it will all be my fault..._ The novelist's eyes squeezed shut as he tried to force his brain into some sort of understanding. A few tense moments of silence hung over the room... still nothing. 

            With a low sound somewhere between a growl and a groan, Eiri sunk to the floor, head in his hands. _I can't do it. I've failed again. _The familiar tightness attacked his chest, making it hard as hell to breathe as despair threatened to take over. This whole trip had been a nightmare of impotence. The harder he tried, the less it seemed he was able to help Shuichi. Here, at last, he was being forced to give up. Slowly, agonizingly, he began... to let go.

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lookie here, chapter seven! wow, this was a long one… i've actually had this done for a few days, but the lack of reviews was depressing… so i only got around to posting it now, and really only because i've also finished chapter eight and thought it was silly to have two chapters done and neither one posted. ^^;; so please, people, give us feedback! make midori-chan smile! 

on a related note… where the heck are my flames?! i know there must be SOME people out there who think this story is crap and that therefore i do not deserve to live, but none of them have told me so as of yet. what gives? the name of the game is criticism, people, and i want all of it. so please, flame me to your heart's content! granted, if you flame midori-chan i'll rip your face off, but anything of mine is fair game (in case you've forgotten, that would be yuki and the editing). if i don't get any flames, i'll just assume that _everyone_ who read the story liked it at least all right… which, while somewhat improbable, would be kinda cool. if you hate it, though, feel free to prove me wrong. ^_________^

and now, since i've already *cough* finished chapter eight, a very definite **next-chapter teaser**: will eiri pull himself together? does ryuichi's riddle have an answer? where is shuichi, anyway? will they be able to find him before it's too late? yet another gravitation character appears (bearing a plot twist, as usual) and i absolutely guarantee a cliff-hanger. stay tuned! XD

—vethia and midori-chan


	8. Answer

**disclaimer****: if i owned gravi, i would not be anywhere near as desperate for a job as i am now. -_-**

**note****: the new character appearing in this chapter was also written by midori-chan, though i went back and added some bits during the edit for the sake of continuity. enjoy!**

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            As Eiri began to slump, a voice slowly unfolded into the void of numbness. _That which is possessed, but cannot be seen; comes in many forms, yet remains fundamentally the same... you have it, don't you, Eiri Uesugi? As much as you deny it, as often as you hide it, you can't help but keep it... you cannot help but have faith. You believed in Sakuma-san, even when Tohma told you what he did to Shuichi, and you still believe that you can find him. That's what Ryuichi's riddle means. Go to the house of faith._

            Eiri's head jerked up, eyes widening with sudden understanding as he whispered into the darkness. "Faith..." With newfound resolve, he jerked himself to his feet. "A church. We have to find the nearest church. That's where Shuichi is." 

            Ryuichi seemed shocked by this sudden revelation, his topaz-set eyes glimmering with hope. "You... think?" His hands gripped his K-chan as he slowly planted his feet on the ground in another attempt to stand up.

            "Yeah. Come on, we have to hurry." Eiri started towards the door, then glanced backwards. "Can you walk...?"

            "Yeah." Ryuichi pressed his hands against the wall, eyes shining with determination—almost as if his soul had been renewed through Eiri's simple words. He nodded and stood up, shakily at first, and then walked assuredly over to Eiri. "I'm ready to go!" He gave the writer a thumbs-up and a grin. 

            This new confidence seemed to please Eiri. "Good," he replied, and pushed open the concert hall door once again. Out on the street, he stopped, looking from side to side rather helplessly, then turned back to Ryuichi. "I... don't know London well. Do you know where there is a church?" 

            "Yup~" With a glimmer shimmering on the tips of his fingers, he pointed to a slim cross jutting out from atop the high-rising buildings. "C'mon, Eiri-san!" He waved his hand over in the direction of the church and began to pick up a steady run. 

            Eiri followed, urgent now, running after the singer through the darkened streets of London. _Please, let me be right... Shuu-chan..._ A lump started to form in his throat and was quickly suppressed. Gritting his teeth, he ran a little faster.

            It seemed like only moments before the two reached their destination. Dwarfed by the doors, Ryuichi pressed hard against one, and nearly fell into the monstrous church, bathed in an eerie rose light. Nothing was there save for the light, a huge cross at the altar, and pews running up and down the sides of the church.  

            Eiri came in behind the singer and slowed to a halt, looking around. His voice was low, the habit of deference impossible to break. "Where is he...?" Turning slowly, he faced Ryuichi. "One of you has to know." 

            "Somewhere dark..." Ryuichi stared down the aisle. A tremor shook his body. "Behind the altar." 

            Eiri broke into a run again, pelting down the aisle, leaving the singer behind. A brief hesitation caught him just in front of the altar, but he shook it off quickly and stepped towards the wooden pedestal. Ryuichi tried to scramble up after Eiri, but he was stopped by cold metal pressed against his temple. He gasped, clutching blindly at the arms that gripped him from behind, feet beating against the floor in what was ultimately a futile effort to break free. 

            The sounds of the scuffle jerked Eiri's head around just before he could look behind the altar. _What the hell...?_ His eyes widened as he discerned a familiar face. _Aizawa__ Tachi..._ _I should have known!_ So quickly that his surprise was barely recognizable as such, any 'weak' emotion was resolved into a blank mask, giving way to the cold, hard expression in narrowed eyes.  

            "Don't move...Yuki Eiri." Aizawa pressed the gun harder to the side of the NG singer's head, the business end nestled softly in the chocolate-haired boy's eardrum. Ryuichi was shaking violently, staring at Eiri with blank, wet eyes, hands squeezing his Kumagorou so tight that its eyes could have very well popped out of its head. 

            Eiri ground his teeth but remained still. When he spoke, the voice was one which Ryuichi has not heard practically since their arrival in London—the cold, emotionless tones of the novelist's 'public' persona. His eyes were flashing, a direct contrast to the flat sound of his voice—save, perhaps, that both were quite obviously dangerous. "What are you doing here?" 

            "I could ask you the same thing." Aizawa's voice was tense and guarded. He knelt beside Ryuichi and whispered, in a voice loud enough so Eiri could hear, "...do you know why Eiri's here?" His eyes flashed back at Eiri, never leaving the novelist's face for a moment, as if he was speaking to the blonde man instead of to his captive. 

            _Bastard couldn't look away for so much as a second... damn it!_ Eiri's eyes flickered to the alter for a mere fraction of a second. He wished he could move _just_ far enough to see behind it... but Aizawa still had that gun, and Eiri couldn't move while ASK's lead singer had Nittle Grasper's corresponding component at gunpoint. 

            _I need a distraction... something, anything, to get me closer to him._ The familiar bulge beneath his coat seemed somehow more prominent than ever before, though he was well aware that no one but he could possibly discern its existence. Clenching his jaw with a silent apology to Sakuma-san, Eiri held his peace to allow Aizawa time to play his mind games. _Overconfident little fuck is bound to slip up. It's only a matter of time..._

            Ryuichi buried his face in Kumagorou and whispered shakily, "I...d-don't know..." 

            "Wrong answer." Aizawa cocked the gun and shoved it farther into Ryuichi's ear. Blood dribbled from the point of contact, staining the barrel of the gun a dull red. Aizawa's eyes held Eiri's throughout, deep and dark and intense. 

            _You little fuck._ Carefully keeping anything but deadly, dangerous amusement out of his voice, Eiri twisted his lips in a cold smile. "Really, Tachi-kun. I thought you had a bit more class than this." 

            Taking a gamble, Eiri flowed forward one small step, timing it to coincide with his speech so that Aizawa might not notice the movement. "You and Sakuma-san have no business with one another. Whatever would you need him for?"

            "He works with that bastard, Seguchi-san... _he _represents the competition ASK has for center stage..." Aizawa seemed to take, perhaps, a moment longer than he ought to come up with these answers, but there was no question as to the anger in his voice when he used Tohma's name. The emotion was quickly suppressed, however, as Aizawa continued his speech with a slightly odd tone—almost as if it were more of a question than a statement. "…and _he_ seems to be getting in your way, Eiri-san." 

            Aizawa's eyes narrowed slightly, as if searching for some response in Eiri's face. When he found none, he pressed on, slightly more forceful. "I thought I might take him AND his miserable little voices out of your life—forever." Still no response. Eiri just stared at him, cold with anger, seeing nothing but melodrama. 

            With a low growl of frustration, Aizawa snapped out, "You shouldn't be mad at me—you should be _thanking_ me, Eiri-san!" Ryuichi whimpered suddenly, the blood beginning to drip upon Kumagorou's face, smearing its smiling expression with an eerie cinnabar. Aizawa's lips snapped shut at the noise and he pressed the gun harder against Ryuichi's head, almost in desperation. 

            Caught up in Aizawa's words, Eiri failed to notice the other man's actions. His mind was working a mile a minute. _How the _hell_ does he know about that?!? Does everyone know about Ryuichi except me?_ It was a credit to Eiri's composure that his expression did not change in the slightest; what with the thoughts running through his head, _something ought to have show on the outside, but the writer was too well-controlled for that. _

            Eiri _was_ paying enough attention to see that Aizawa was reasonably distracted, however. In light of this, he coupled his next phrase with another step forward, advancing on the man with the gun. "I have no idea what you're talking about, Tachi-kun. Sakuma-san and I are traveling around London." 

            Aizawa snarled in frustration, but Eiri ignored it. Another step, accompanied by a smirk. "And if you think you can hurt him and get away with it.... really, show a bit of sense. Do you honestly think Seguchi-san will agree to pick up ASK again if you harm his lead singer?" He took another step. "And _who_ do you really expect to take on a band which has been dropped from NG's promotion lineup...?" 

            At this, Tachi flinched a bit, as if Eiri had hit a nerve. He twisted the gun against the captive's ear even _more,_ making him cry out in pain. Tears began to fall now, as Ryuichi started to sob into his bunny. Aizawa ignored the plaintive cries, still concentrating on Eiri. "You're only hurting him!" 

            Eiri stopped short. It was a strain to keep up the smiling facade, but he did so, even twisting the smirk a little farther. "Think about it, Tachi-kun. You would do well to let Sakuma-san be and save your reputation with Seguchi Tohma. Now get going. You're wasting my time..." He dropped the smile quite suddenly, eyes flashing with palpable threat. "...and I don't like people who waste my time." 

            Tachi grimaced. _You dumb fuck… can't you _listen_ for once instead of getting so damned defensive?!_ He dragged Ryuichi to his feet, raising his voice a decibel, and played his hidden card. "I know where Shuichi is! Don't you _dare_ act like you've won anything yet, Yuki Eiri!" The words seemed strangely distant, as if even as he spoke them, Aizawa had ceased to assign importance to their meaning. 

            To Eiri, however, the words meant everything. _That...__ BASTARD..._ If there had been any way that Eiri's eyes could become more cold, more dangerous, or more menacing, they did so. His voice trembled with rage, though the tone was low and threatening. "I think you remember what happened _last_ time you hurt Shuu-chan..." He took a step forward in spite of himself, unable to hold his ground when the air crackled with such tension. 

            Ryuichi had not noticed Eiri's steps, or if he had, he made no sign that he did. Inwardly, his mind was once again becoming a mess of voices and shouting, and complete chaos, as the only thing that was truly real to him was the gun wedged firmly to his skull. Everything else seemed to fade into the abyss... it all seemed so... distorted. 

            He could hear Tachi speaking something cold and curt back to Eiri, but it only registered in his head like the hum of a cooling fan in a hot summer's breeze. Some conscious thought in his head told him that he'd taken in too much stress... too much... and he wanted so badly for this to end. His eyes grew darker and muddier with each passing second as Tachi spoke to Eiri, the gun pressing harder and harder against his throbbing ear. 

            The more Eiri talked, the less Aizawa seemed to notice his movements. The writer felt like he was walking on a tightrope, trying desperately to keep his balance with just the right balance of threat and prodding while avoiding the chasams of failure on either side. His brain was racing for things to say. _A little closer... just a little closer...._

            It was much easier to approach the singers with small, cautious steps, timed to coincide with each new threat his mouth rattled off without help from his brain. _He must know... he must know that he has the upper hand. I'm too far away...._ But Tachi didn't seem to know, or at any rate, he didn't realize the exact nature of his position. Eiri hoped fervently that this meant he was still as imposing as ever. 

            Aizawa, for his part, was doing his level best to respond to each new threat, keeping his grip on Ryuichi with his left arm and clutching the gun with his right hand. Ryuichi was so small that Aizawa's arm could slip easily around his waist, and the ASK singer thanked several sets of gods when he found that he could _just_ reach his right pocket across Ryuichi's body.

            Eiri could sense his adversary's distraction and took advantage of it. _Almost there.... yes._ Close enough, now, that with a quick motion he could nearly touch the other man, Yuki stopped, keeping his eyes locked on Aizawa's as his hand reached surreptitiously under his jacket. _He's not crazy enough to actually hurt Sakuma-san. Even he must realize how monumentally stupid that would be. Tachi's career is more important to him than anything. He's not so far gone that he'll endanger that for the sake of revenge... is he....?_

            Tachi suddenly noticed Eiri's proximity and stepped back slightly, again pressing the gun into Ryuichi as if a sudden fear had overtaken him. The NG vocalist let out a small gasp, and plummeted headfirst into a well of his own voices. _*Ryuichi, what do you wish for, more than anything?* (I wish... I wish Eiri could see Shuu-chan again...) *What do you think is preventing him from seeing him right now...?* (...I am...) *What do you think got Eiri into this situation?* (I did...it was... all my fault...) *And how do you think you'll EVER get rid of us?* (...I only know one way... It'll solve everything.)_

            Ever so slowly, while Aizawa and Eiri were both distracted, he reached behind Tachi to rest a hand upon the man's waist as yet another, as yet unseen personality kicked in. His eyes ran torrents as he spoke in a soft voice. "Aizawa-san... let me show you how to _really_ use that gun." He spun suddenly and grabbed the gun from his ear, now shoving it into Tachi's cheek, blood smearing the side of the man's startled face. "Like this." His fingers pulled the trigger, but as he did so, his normal personality reasserted itself and re-directed the gun from Tachi's cheek to his own temple. 

            BAM.

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there. cliff-hanger, as promised. ^____________________^ i remain astounded by the lack of flames on this story…. flamers, the invitation from chapter seven still stands. the fact that no-one as taken me up on it is kinda nifty. feel free to squash my hopes and dreams! XD

remember, feedback keeps the chapters flowing. c'mon, push the button. it'll make our day.

**next**** chapter: …oh, come on. as if you _really need a teaser with that ending. stay tuned!_**

-vethia & midori-chan


	9. Twist

look! LOOK! behold, i have finally finished this chapter! i know, i know, long time coming… i'll explain at the bottom.

**disclaimer****:** as always, i am just not cool enough to own gravi, even though i had… what… two months to get the rights? nope. didn't happen. 

**note****:** as in the last chapter, tachi is written by midori-chan, but i've added a great deal to make his thoughts more accessible to us poor mortals. and with that, please enjoy chapter nine. i know it's been a long time coming. ^^;;

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_"NO!!!!"_ As fast as lightning, Eiri sprang forward, slamming into Sakuma-san with enough force to knock the boy's aim off-kilter. As he moved, the right hand in his jacket pulled outward, and in it... a gun. Eiri used his momentum to scoop Ryuichi into his left arm, pinning the singer's arms so that he could do no further harm, aiming his newly-revealed revolver unerringly at Aizawa Tachi.

            Ryuichi was breathing hard, crying openly in the empty silence of the church. His body went limp as Tachi eyed the tables that had suddenly been turned on him. "...What did you want Sakuma-san for?"

            Breathing ever-so-slightly heavy, Eiri smirked. "If I let Tohma's lead singer blow his own head off, I'd never hear the end of it." Inside, though, there was a kernel of warm satisfaction beneath the flippant exterior. _We're not out of this yet... but we're closer, and no one had... to die._ _Things are going to be different this time. _The little voice he tried so hard to suppress, the source of his reluctant compassion and the betrayer of his secret heart, whispered softly, _You__ were right to have faith in him. _He allowed himself a slight smile at this thought before his expression went frighteningly blank. "Now... tell me where Shuu-chan is." The gun was still pointed straight at Aizawa, and something about Eiri's stance suggested that he knew how to use it. Aizawa, still shaken from the earlier conflict, could only point towards the altar. He felt the sudden urge to faint envelop his senses. _Shit, shit, shit… He doesn't get it. He doesn't get it at all. What the hell do I do _now? 

            Ryuichi was still a mental mess, squirming in Eiri's arm and crying pitifully, tracks of tears staining his cheeks red. Holding him gently but firmly, Eiri backed towards the altar, gun still trained on Aizawa. His aim never wavered, though Ryuichi could feel the slight trembling of his arm and, with concentration, could distinguish the sweat beading on his forehead. As easy as he made it seem, holding that gun steady was quite possibly the hardest... well, the _second_-hardest thing Yuki Eiri had ever had to do. 

            Step by step, he inched backwards until he was flush with the wooden altar. _This is it..._ With a steadying breath, he took his eyes off Tachi for the first time, out of necessity, and glanced behind the altar. In the darkness, he could barely make out a dusty trapdoor, with a heavy wooden handle latched to the side. 

            The moment Eiri's eyes were away from him, Tachi grabbed the gun Ryuichi had tried to shoot himself with, and aimed it at the two. He cocked the gun with a _click. _"Shouldn't have looked away..." Tachi exhaled in relief, though the fact still remained that both he and Eiri had a gun. This thought gave way to a grim sneer. _If you weren't such a fucking self-centered egotistical asshole, we wouldn't be in this situation. Fuck you, Yuki Eiri. Despite the obvious gravity his predicament, Tachi was almost tempted to laugh. __What irony. _

            Eiri's eyes snapped back to the sneering, black-haired singer. _Fuck!_ Eyes narrowing, he cocked his own revolver, still trained on Tachi. His voice was even and smooth as he very slowly released Ryuichi. "Sakuma-san. Go and open the trap door." Ryuichi nodded through his dry hiccupping sobs and dropped to his feet, biting his lip tremulously as he cowered behind the altar and tugged at the handle. Tachi glared at Eiri through angry eyes, feeling as if he has already lost this battle, though trying desperately to still keep a handle on this situation. The only sounds that could be heard in the church were the creaking of metal and the vocalist's sobs. Sweat beaded on the writer's forehead and trickled into his eyes, but he didn't dare blink. It was sheer torment to force himself not to look over at Ryuichi, not to try to help in some way... but he knew better than that. One false move, one careless stumble, and both he and Sakuma-san would be dead. _I can't look... I can't. I just have to trust him_. 

            Ryuichi's hands trembled as he struggled with his task. _(I can't do it...I'm too weak...I can't open it...)_ He let out a cold sob, hands shaking violently upon the metal._ (I...can't...) | Godamnit, Sakuma-san, if I thought you were going to be this much of a wuss, I wouldn't be talking to you right now... |_ Ryuichi did a double-take as he heard his voice reprimand him for the first time rather than taunting him. _(...what...)__ *That's right, Ryuichi, you damn fuck. I'm not staying here any longer if you can't even open that door, what with Eiri counting on you...* (He's...what...?) | Counting on you. Are you deaf? Open that door. | (I...I...)_ He wrenched on the handle, and the door flew open, filling the room with dust. 

            A loud bang reverberated throughout the building as the door clattered to the floor. Tachi jumped as the sudden sound broke the uncomfortable silence falling about himself and Eiri, but recovered himself quickly enough to use the distraction to his advantage. Moving quickly, he hid the object he'd extracted from his pocket when he had Sakuma-san pinned, fingers dancing over it in a familiar pattern. _Please, please let me do this right… Luckily for Tachi, Eiri was distracted by the noise—not enough that he took his eyes off the singer, but enough that the movement went unnoticed._

            On Eiri's right, just out of his peripheral vision, Ryuichi peered into the darkness below. A pair of shaking, wet blue eyes stared up at him from a veil of dirty pink hair and a pale face graced with cuts and caked blood. The boy stared at Ryuichi for a moment, completely dumbfounded and perhaps a little nervous. Finally he spoke. "Sakuma-san..." Trembling to the point of another near mental breakdown, Ryuichi reached down into the orifice in the floor and embraced the Bad Luck singer. "...Shuu…" 

            Eiri finally let out the breath he'd been holding for goodness-knows-how long. He couldn't even remember himself. He did _not_, however, take his eyes off of Aizawa as he raised his voice slightly to call out, "Shuichi... get up here. Do you have any idea how much trouble you've caused us...?" 

            "YUKI?!!" Shuichi's voice rang as clear as a bell as he looked past Ryuichi in shock. "Hai hai, I'm sorry..." He grinned, wiping the tears from his eyes. "I'm fine." Ryuichi pulled him up out of the dark hole he'd been in for god knows how long and fell down in exhaustion, another barrage of tears falling down his alabaster face. Shuichi reacted instantly. "Sakuma-san?!" The pink-haired one was immediately at his friend's side, holding him with his ashen arms and asking, "Are you okay?" Ryuichi didn't respond, though, just lay there, quiet... 

            Eyes still fixed on Aizawa, Eiri spoke again, voice tight with worry—though it could very easily be misinterpreted as annoyance or coldness. "Shuichi, help Sakuma-san up." His eyes narrowed, glaring coldly at ASK's lead singer. The gun did not waver. "We're leaving."

            _Shit, shit, SHIT! I have to distract him… Aizawa searched for something, anything to say, anything to keep the writer in place. "I'll tell you something." He moved his body closer to Eiri, both hands coming to rest upon the gun, now that he no longer needs his left for other things. "_I_ was the only one that visited that poor bastard in his little white prison cell. I came looking for someone else, but I found him... you all didn't even care enough to visit him..." His voice grew tight with anger, though he refused to voice the fact that he'd been __looking for his bandmate Ma-kun, the man Yuki Eiri had beaten senseless for Tachi's own crimes… _No. I can't think about that right now. Have to focus._ _

            Frowning suddenly, Eiri couldn't help but glance in Sakuma-san's direction, if only for a fraction of a second. When his eyes pulled back to Aizawa, their expression had not changed, but his mind was racing. _Tachi__ knew about this, too? Was I the only one kept in the dark?! Went looking for someone else, huh? What could he mean? What the hell is the _truth?Eiri's grip tightened ever-so-slightly on the gun. "Step back, Tachi-kun." His words said nothing of the turmoil within his mind. 

            "No." Tachi growled furiously, obviously beginning to lose his cool about the whole situation. "_He_ was the one that started this, right? If he hadn't told me about that unfortunate incident with Shuichi, I wouldn't have been involved, would I? It's _his_ fault..." He glared straight into the writer's cool eyes, then faltered a bit. _Fuck, fuck, fuck… I'm messing this all up, and time is running out…_ Behind the altar, Shuichi was cradling Ryuichi's head in his arms, talking to him softly, trying desperately to wake Sakuma-san from his self-dug pit of despair. He looked up, topaz eyes full of pain. "Yuki...I want to go home..." 

            Stuck in the middle of a situation he couldn't fathom, Eiri could, at first, do little more than stare at Tachi. _There are too many lies here. Way too many. What am I supposed to believe...?_ The gun remained pointed at Aizawa's head, but Yuki did not move forward. After a long moment of silence, staring into the gun-toting singer's eyes, he spoke quietly. "_Someone_ in this room is going to tell me _exactly_ what has been going on—and I mean _everything_. Right. Now." He was greeted by silence. Having bought himself the time he needed, Tachi was simply content to glare at Eiri, mouth drawn tight. Shuichi could only stare up at Yuki sadly, and Ryuichi was... comatose... 

            _All right, apparently he's going to make this hard._ Eiri took an experimental step backwards towards Shuichi and Ryuichi, gun still aimed at Aizawa, without looking where he was stepping. _Careful..._ He couldn't really say, at that moment, who or what he believed—all of his attention was focused on finding out the truth, and since Tachi apparantly wouldn't cooperate, Shuichi and Ryuichi were his only links. _Now if only he doesn't blow my head off..._

            Tachi glared as he watched Eiri take a step backward, and his mouth twisted into a manic smile. _One more step, you bastard... I did my part. I've seen it through. You were just too stubborn to listen. If you do something stupid, after all, who's to say I didn't act in self-defense…? _Shuichi's voice cut into Tachi's thoughts, high-pitched and nervous. "Yuki? What's going on? I can't see..." He rose suddenly, _with_ Ryuichi's head still in his arms, trying to catch a glimpse of Tachi. 

            "Shuichi, stay down," Yuki snapped tightly, stopping in his tracks. _Damn it... if Shuu-chan gets in his line of sight, he could...._ The thought was quickly stifled; Yuki refused to let it go any further. Shuichi stopped and rolled back on his legs with a worried sigh, gazing down at the man lying with his eyes open and blank. "Gomen nasai, Yuki..." 

            _A rock and a hard place... isn't that the American metaphor...?_ More than anything, Eiri needed to know what had happened to Ryuichi... but with Aizawa's threat hanging over him, he couldn't move any further backward. Grimacing slighty, he decided that he'd have to go for plan B: getting information from the _other_ source that seemed to have something to hide. "Tell me why you're here." His eyes, narrow and cold, were unswervingly fixed on Aizawa.

            "Fuck off," Tachi answered promptly. _You'd know already if you weren't so damned thickheaded! His eyes narrowed. "I'm the one with the power here, not you."_

            "You seem to forget that we are at a stalemate. Tell me how you got Shuichi in here, and what you have to do with Sakuma-san's condition."

            Tachi grimaced as Eiri's words pierced his ears, but again thinned his lips defiantly as he refused to answer. Inside, though, he was screaming. _Where the hell are you, you bastard?! It's taking too damn long… this fucking writer and his fucking boyfriend and their fucking crazy friend are going to kill me, right now, right here, and you're going to walk in two seconds too late. Maybe that was the plan all along…_Tachi did his damnedest not to let his growing desperation show on his face. He still had a gun. Things could still work out.

            Eiri's lips tightened almost imperceptibly with frustration, but he kept his cool in front of Aizawa. "Tachi-kun... you are beginning to get on my nerves."

            "I could say the same damn thing about you, Eiri... san..." For the first time, Eiri began to get the feeling there was something else Tachi was withholding, something that didn't have anything to do with Shuichi at all. The writer frowned and took another look at Tachi, who raised an eyebrow, impeccably generating the phrase _"Why don't you just figure it out for yourself?" _from a single motion. Sweat was beginning to pool in the crevasse of his Tachi's neck and he sighed exasperatedly, eyes glaring hard at Eiri. 

            _That's it. I'm through with playing games._ It was a gamble, but Eiri had had enough. In his previous encounters with Aizawa Tachi, the man had talked tough, but he seemed to have some sort of fear of the novelist... Eiri would just have to rely on that. _He won't shoot me. Even he is not that stupid._ With a single quick, decisive movement, Eiri closed the distance between himself and the altar, moving without taking his eyes from Tachi. He knelt beside his two charges; a quick, fluid motion which nonetheless keeps his gun aimed right at Aizawa. "Shuichi... hand me Sakuma-san." 

            "Ah...oh...okay..." The pink haired boy's tone was filled with misunderstanding and hurt. Nevertheless, he handed the limp boy over to Eiri-san, being careful to place Kumagorou with Ryuichi as he was transferred to the other man's arms. Eiri settled the unconscious boy against his chest, worried that it would throw off his aim, but unwilling to let this fear show on his face. Softly, he spoke to the young singer. "Shuichi... can you walk?" His eyes didn't leave his adversary, but the tone was one that has not been heard since the beginning of this ordeal, the one that Shuichi was only used to hearing during Eiri's rare but precious moments of love and compassion. True, there was less emotion in his voice than he was feeling at the moment, but the restraint was clear—as clear as the reason, who was still scowling across the church, gun pointed squarely at Eiri's head. 

            "H-hai, I think," the boy answered, tone still slightly nervous. Just as Shuichi began to get up, however, the eyes of the man in Eiri's arms snapped open, and he threw an arm around the writer's neck, sobbing audibly. The sobs ceased in an instant, though, as blank, pale blue eyes blinked back open, tendering a stare of pure malice down at the trembling singer kneeling upon the floor. Shuichi shrunk back with a sharp intake of breath as Sakuma-san's eyes found his. The older man glared downward, but his voice was focused in another direction. "Don't move, Eiri-san." His grip tightened around his Kumagorou defensively, and he snaked his arm even further around the writer's neck in a strangling hold. 

            Completely surprised, Eiri choked and faltered, stumbling slightly as his airways were restricted. "W-what the...?" he gasped, then choked out, "Sakuma-san! Let go!" This was definitely not part of the plan.

            "No." Eiri's new captor grinned in a childish glee, pressing his cheek to Eiri's and staring him maniacally in the eye. "I thank you for retrieving my Kumagorou. Given that it's filled with expensive explosives, it would've been a bitch if I'd lost it!" Eiri's eyes widened in alarm. He was so stunned, he couldn't even react—but someone else in the room was not. Hearing the new and frightening tone in Ryuichi's voice, Tachi choked slightly and faltered, the weary expression becoming evident upon his face as his hands loosened against his gun. _Fuck! That stupid shitting writer… wouldn't fucking listen… and now we're all fucked. _No, Tachi wasn't surprised. Despite his exhaustion, he pleaded with the other singer, trying desperately to buy them all a few more precious moments. "Dammit, Sakuma, don't _do_ this!" 

            Still staring unblinkingly at Eiri, the vocalist replied in a harsh snap, "Tired of trying to tell him that K-chan was loaded without me knowing it?" Tachi paled. _Well, at least someone __knew what I was trying to do… but why did it have to be him? He had no choice but to swallow his words and hang his head dejectedly. "…Bastard.," he muttered helplessly. There wasn't much else he could do._

            Choking, fighting to breathe, Eiri lowered his gun almost involuntarily. _Shit, shit, shit... Why didn't I realize before? That angry personality, the one who snapped at me in the airport... he's been in there all along, manipulating us all. _Eiri felt like something that one would scrape off the bottom of one's shoe. _Tachi__ was trying to warn me...  I guess the little bastard really did reform. _All of these thoughts and more flew through the novelist's head in a matter of seconds, but only one remained, achingly strong. _Shuichi... I need to get him out of here!_ He tried to speak, to scream, to call out a warning to his lover before it was too late, but all that emerged was a strangled gasp as his vision began to blur, a product of Sakuma-san's stranglehold.

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ta-da!! i hope that wasn't too disappointing, after waiting so long… in my own defense, this was one of the harder chapters to edit, since i actually had to write in a lot of stuff that wasn't there to begin with. i've also been working 9-5 to try to pay for school, so cut me some slack, hai? ^^;;

you know you wanna review… gee, i hope everyone hasn't stopped reading. if so i might cry. well, no, i won't… but midori-chan might, and i might stop posting this fic altogether. -_- so anyway, give us some love. or some hate! i take both. ^_____^

**next**** chapter: who was tachi waiting for? what will become of eiri and shuichi? who is telling the truth and who isn't? stay tumed!**

-vethia & midori-chan 


	10. Resolution

ok… i know. i know an explanation is due. it's been almost six months since i last updated this fic. shameful! i know, i know!! i suppose everyone deserves at least a bit of an explanation… during those six months, not only did i have a lot of schoolwork to do, but my gravitation rp Faith in Gravity ) died a sad, slow death. i'll admit it: when that happened, i didn't really feel inspired to update this story any more, since this was what sparked the entire game to begin with. BUT!! every now and again, an email would show up in my inbox with a nice review from one of you wonderful readers, and with that impetus plus the catalyst of one tremendous yuki player ( ), i have finally gotten my ass in gear and finished Faith. yes, that's right—finished. this is the last chapter. there's an epilogue, yes, but that's all. i hope it was worth the wait, and i want to thank everyone who reviewed this story from the bottom of my cold, shriveled writer's heart. 

so now, without further ado, i give you: the end of Faith.

**disclaimer****:** despite my six-month negotiations with maki murakami, right stuf (who is putting out the gravitation dub! which you should all GO OUT AND BUY as soon as it's available, because then you can hear my voice on it! /end shameless plug) and all other media conglomerates involved, no, i still do not own gravitation. for the love of cheese dip, don't sue me. my credit card bills are bad enough already. 

* * *

            "Don't faint just yet, Eiri-san... your truth is about to unfold." Ryuichi giggled, tightening his grip around the writer's neck. Eiri saw stars. He blinked, once, trying to clear them, but the blackness at the edge of his vision was starting to creep in.

             Just then, Tohma ran into the church, huffing and puffing from overuse of his skinny legs. "Sakuma-san...what..." His face drained as he saw Eiri's peril out of sparkling teal eyes. The cellphone upon which he had received Aizawa's 'SOS' text message was still clutched in his hand.  "Oh God…" The producer swallowed slightly. If he had failed to protect Eiri-san a second time, he honestly did not know what he would do with himself. 

            Ryuichi acknowledged the mortified blonde with a curt nod. His eyes flickered for a moment as he called, "Tachi? Care to explain?" Aizawa dropped his gun and heaved a waterlogged sigh. "I _was _looking for Ma-kun... something had happened to him, relating to Ryuichi… and I wanted to find out. I stopped by his room, and tried to talk to Sakuma-san, but all I ever heard from him was..." He turned to Tohma, almost accusingly, mimicking the other singer's distress. "'Oh God... get them out of my head, Tachi... it hurts... I want them out...'" 

            Tohma's eyes widened, but he continued with what Aizawa had failed to say. "Aizawa took Shuichi immediately to London from the time that he was hospitalized in Tokyo, and tried to prevent Ryuichi's discovery of his location..." Then the singer himself cut in, finishing with a deadly trill in his voice, "...Because if I killed him, and I killed myself, and I killed you," he nodded his head to Tohma at this, indicating the direction of his pronoun reference, and continued smoothly, "…and I killed Eiri-san, and Aizawa-san..." He smiled sadly. "All the pain would go away."  
            All this time, Shuichi had been staring at Eiri through wide, crystal eyes. "Yuki..." Despite the haze encroaching on his vision, the writer could see the confirmation written all over his lover's face. He had to do something. He just had to.

            The distraction of Tohma's presence and the ongoing conversation seemed to have distracted Ryuichi, and Eiri could feel the singer's grasp on his throat loosening slightly. He sucked in oxygen, fighting to clear his vision as his mind raced desperately. _The bunny... That pink rabbit is the key to everything; Ryuichi's personality shifts, the threat he poses, everything. I have to do something about the bunny... If I do, maybe I can reason with him. _The rabbit in question was lying on Ryuichi's chest, staring blankly at the novelist. Around him, the conversation continued, explanations unfolding whether he liked them or not.

            "...Tachi was really nice to me, Yuki...you don't have to worry," Shuichi was saying, smiling tentatively. "He told me I had to hide in..." He was interrupted by a hacking cough, wracking his beaten body convulsively before he could continue. "...here."

            Tohma averted his eyes to the floor, head spinning as he gritted out, "I followed Ryuichi when I found out he'd escaped. When I figured he was going to London, I sent those text messages. I reasoned that if we all were here, we could be able to stop him..." He closed his eyes. "...from doing something rash." Ryuichi laughed coldly at Tohma, waving something shiny and metallic in front of Eiri's face. "And I almost forgot, Eiri-san. My cell phone... it's the detonator." His finger was idling steady on the "END" key of the phone... what an ironic button to use to detonate explosives.  
            _The phone?!__ Damn it all... _Eiri thought back in horror. How close he had been to disaster, with a bunny full of explosives and the detonator in his hand! If he had been a little less distracted at the airport, he might have sent hundreds of people to their deaths... _This has to stop._ As Sakuma-san's attention drifted further from Eiri and closer to the other members of the room, the writer thought back to all the different sides of the boy he had seen. _No more games. No more in-betweens. I have to talk to them directly, and I have to do it _now. 

            With a quick twist of his arms, Eiri slipped out from under the singer, letting Ryuichi fall haphazardly to the ground by the altar. Without letting go of his gun, he used it to knock the cellphone out of Ryuichi's hand and send it skittering across the floor. _They design those things so that the buttons _don't_ get pressed by accident..._ Eiri could only pray that the rough treatment would not turn the cellphone into an instrument of destruction. He snatched the rabbit with his other hand, then knelt quickly over Sakuma-san, keeping the boy from moving while he held the bunny hostage. "All right. It's time to talk."  
            The vocalist let forth an angry snarl, straining under Eiri's grip, his sinewy muscles taut. Finally, dark, menacing eyes turned to look at the writer through a veil of brown bangs. "Goddamnit, Eiri!!" He reached his left hand up and dug his nails roughly into Eiri's shoulder, letting red flow from underneath his fingertips and saturate Eiri's shirt. The grip loosened, though, as Ryuichi threw his head back and emitted a single lonely, empty sob. Before anyone could react, he was re-possesed by malevolent Sakuma-san, who proceeded to burrow his fingers further into Eiri. 

            Shuichi let forth a gasp, and ran to help Eiri, calling out, "Yuki!!!" Eiri let out a hiss of pain as the blood began to flow, but did not loosen his grip on the singer. Instead, he waited out the storm, steeling himself against the brief vision of the pain in the eyes of the suppressed Ryuichi. "Shuichi, stay back! It's all right... I'll handle this." _I don't want you anywhere near this situation. You've been hurt too much already..._ Through clenched teeth, he addressed Sakuma-san. "That won't work any more. Like it or not, you're going to have to talk to me." ****

"Would you really like to know what it's like to get inside _our_ head, Eiri-san?" A voice, far less angry than Ryuichi's malevolent personality, slithered from the boy's lips. His eyes became cloudy, reminiscent of the time when he'd been leaning against the windowpane at Eiri's house. "I don't think you want to know what's there..." 

            Eiri would really rather not be having this discussion in front of Tohma, Aizawa and Shuichi... _especially Shuichi_... but he steeled himself and spoke anyway. "You said yourself that I would understand. Don't you remember?" He searched the singer's eyes, hoping for some glimmer of understanding or memory. "Why don't you try it?" While the writer was speaking, Tohma suddenly appeared beside Eiri, looking a little worn out as he pinned Ryuichi's other hand to the floor. _He won't try _that_ again with Eiri-san..._ The NG vocalist, however, stared at Eiri with a melancholy look, eyes mirroring a stormy sky. He shuddered and a tear fell from between darkened lashes. "He doesn't want to hurt you, Eiri-san..."

            A quick glance at Tohma could _almost_ have been relief, but... no. Eiri would never show _that_ kind of emotion to the other blonde. He addressed Ryuichi. "It's a little late for that now. Time to come clean--_all_ of you." Tohma put in his own words, addressing the singer softly, for the first time. "...Ryuichi. I'm sorry." Even as he spoke, however, he knew it was too late for apologies. Eiri's jaw clenched slightly as Tohma speaks. _Sorry, is he...? He said as much to me, once..._ For a moment, he felt a strange sense of kinship with Ryuichi, but he quickly shoved all emotions aside, tightening his grip. 

            The boy began to twitch underneath Tohma and Yuki's hands. "Come clean?" A smirk. "What are you _talking_ about...? I have nothing to hide." Eiri's hand on Sakuma-san's arm was not tight enough to cause discomfort, but it would certainly keep him pinned down. "Then why don't you tell me how you feel...?" Eiri asked. "That's all. Just tell me how you feel."

            Ryuichi averted his eyes for a moment, looking sadly at the ground on which he was pinned. "...Why does Eiri-san ask me that...?" A response came to his own lips as soon as the question was asked. "I don't know. I don't know why anyone would waste their time on you, asking what you feel..." A slight tremor ran through his body. "No one asks me how I feel... That's right. Because you're not worth asking." Tohma's eyes enlarged gradually as he listened to the conversation, his hand quaking upon his old friend's wrist. _Ryuichi__..._

            Eiri's jaw was clenched, his palm sweaty against the cold metal of the gun in his left hand. He _felt_ Tohma's reaction more than he saw it, but did not turn away from Ryuichi. "I'm asking now, Ryuichi. Why don't you tell me...?" Calling upon all of his literary strength, Eiri chose his words with infinite care, structuring every facet of his expression and tone to make Ryuichi believe that, at that moment, he was Eiri's _only_ concern.

            "I feel..." The vocalist's face was impassive, as he turned his face up to meet Eiri's eyes. "Have you ever seen a puppet show, Eiri-san...?" 

            "Yes..." The hand on the gun twitched a little bit, but Eiri tendered no other reaction. "Yes, I have."

            "I feel sorry for the puppets, Eiri-san. What if they don't want to feel sad? What if they don't want to perform?" His eyes flickered a little, tears threatening to fall again. "But no one cares, because they're just puppets. No one realizes what the puppet feels."

            A lump buildt in Eiri's throat and he swallowed involuntarily, speaking softly. "I... I know, Ryuichi. It's hard, isn't it? It's hard to sit back and watch as your life slips away... it's hard not to have control. Isn't it." His tone was strange, a mixture of distance and depth, and his eyes flicked very, very briefly towards Tohma before resettling on Sakuma-san.

            "Yes. Yes..." The words were spoken in soft sobs, as his hands clenched quietly underneath both Eiri and Tohma's grip, each wishing to cover his face so he wouldn't have to cry... not in front of them all. The blonde producer leaned closer to the two of them, eyes melancholy and regretful. "I'm sorry..." It was all he seemed to be able to bring himself to say, as he felt his heart being crushed by Ryuichi's words.

            Eiri swallowed, hard... and slowly let his hand up from Ryuichi's arm. He was still straddling the singer, but the arm was free. His fingers tightened against the gun, then loosened slightly. _It was a long time ago. That was... a long time ago. Sakuma-san is hurting _now._ Don't let him go the way you did..._ "We'll help you, Sakuma-san. It doesn't have to be that way any more." He hated to show such weakness in front of Tohma, hated it more to show such emotions in front of Shuichi... but it was necessary. And really, Eiri didn't have a choice. To think it had been less than a day since the bubbly, happy singer had shown up in Eiri's apartment. They had both learned so much since then. "Ryuichi... it's time to go home."

            Tohma let go of Ryuichi's hand as well, as if by instinct, and the singer claped his hands to his face, sobbing loudly. Tachi, standing dumbfounded on the other side of the altar, stayed as silent as a sentinel. Tohma ran his ringed fingers through Ryuichi's hair, trying to pacify him a little, as the chocolate-haired one stuttered between his sobs, "Okay. Okay, Eiri-san." It was just like the time he had before, at the airport, before any of this had ever happened. Shuichi's cerulean eyes were watching the scene in shock, as he slowly saw his idol break down into tiny fragmented shards in front of Yuki. "...Sakuma-san," he whispered.

            Just as he had several times before, Eiri gathered Ryuichi into his arms, though he first placed the dangerous pink bunny into Tohma's waiting hands. The gun slipped into his jacket again and he settled Sakuma-san against his chest. Straightening carefully, he called softly, "Shuichi... come on. It's time for us _all_ to go home." His lips twisted into a slight smirk. "And hurry up. We're probably already late."

            Shuichi got up suddenly, running to Ryuichi and Eiri as Tohma walked ahead of them, past Aizawa-san and towards the doors. The pink-haired and bedraggled singer burst out, "Is Sakuma-san alright?!" He hugged the crying form as his sad eyes looked upwards to question Eiri. Tachi continued to stare, until something low was spoken from Tohma's throat, and he quickly followed after the producer.

            "He's going to be." Eiri glanced down at Shuichi for a moment, making certain the little singer was ok, then turned his eyes to Tohma. "I think you had better get us a flight back to Japan," he told the producer quietly.

            "Heh. Done." Tohma spoke quietly as well, regaining his composure as he flicked open his petite cell phone and called the airline. When the call was done, his finger lingered upon the END button, carefully eyeing the rabbit, and then the phone. He pressed the button to end the call. Nothing happened. He let out the breath he'd been holding. Tachi walked up beside Tohma. "Is everything alright, Seguchi-san?" he asked carefully. "Heh... if it was alright, I wouldn't be here," the blonde responded, glancing over at Eiri, Shuichi, and Ryuichi. 

            Shuichi gained cute puppy eyes and a puppy tail as he piped up, "Can I sit with you and Sakuma-san on the planneee? Pleaase?" Eiri eyed his lover fondly, though his expression did not reflect it. "Only if you can be quiet. I have a headache." His tone softened the words considerably.

            "YAY!" The pink-haired singer beams ecstatically. "I promise, Yuki, I promisepromisepromise I won't be loud!!" He bounced up and down with glee, stirring Ryuichi to look at him and smile half-heartedly. A tired chuckle was Eiri's response. "All right, you baka. Come on."

            The trip back through the streets of London to the airport seemed to go by in a blur, a stark contrast to Eiri's last trip through this city. Tohma had taken care of everything, and Eiri marveled at the ease that travel took on when NG's producer was in the party. They were immediately bumped up to first class, and Eiri relaxed in the center seat, with Ryuichi by the aisle and Shuichi gracing the window. The tired writer sank back, marveling at the softness of the cushions, and let his thoughts flow. _Thank God Shuichi is safe...._ His eyes drifted to his pink-haired seatmate for a moment and he sighed softly, relieved that the ordeal was over. The events in the church replayed themselves in his mind and he frowned softly. _Tachi__... he must have changed, since ASK was dropped from NG's label. He was trying to help us. Maybe I should have given him more of a chance._ Softly, he slipped his gun out of his jacket, staring down at the cold metal in contemplation.

            Shuichi gazed out of the window in sheer delight, watching as the plane took off and white splotches upon a grey canvas soared into view. He marveled at the rain droplets upon the window—it was always raining in London. Twitching erratically between thoughts, he spinned around to face Yuki. "Na, Yuu—" he paused as he spied the gun.

            Eiri looked up at his lover and raised an eyebrow, but made no move to hide the weapon. "Eh?"

            "Ano..." Shuichi stared in contemplation at the gun for a moment, its lustrous surface reflecting upon the lens of his own eye, creating an odd shine upon the boy's iris. He'd never actually seen a gun shot in his life—he saw it on TV, though, and he always cried when the people they shot died. What would happen if it were in real life...? He turned all the way around, positioning his legs so that they faced Yuki. "Ne... would you have shot Tachi-kun...?" He tore his gaze away from the sparkling gun and stared Yuki in the eyes.

            A brief vision of pain passed across Yuki's golden orbs. He glanced down, shifting gaze calling Shuichi's attention to his hands as he expertly flipped open the revolver and held it up mutely for inspection. Not a single chamber was opaque; the gun was completely empty.

            "Awww, Yuuukiiiii~~!" Shuichi glomped his love, body chibi and eyes grinning. Ryuichi turned to look at the two, and grinned wearily. "Ne, is it Glomp Eiri-san day? I want to glomp him too." His hug was less joyful than Shuichi's, but a hug nonetheless. Tohma peered over from his seat and saw the two hugging Eiri. _Man.._. Today was just _not_ his day, was it?Eiri grunted as he was tackled by the two vocalists, one on each side. "Oi! Shu—" Any further words were cut off as he got the wind knocked out of him, but he didn't seem to mind _quite_ as much as one might expect.****

            "Heh..." Ryuichi yawned, head sliding down upon Eiri's shoulder as he dozed off to sleep. Shuichi grinned broadly as he saw his sleeping friend lying upon the writer's shoulder, and gave Yuki another quick hug before settling into his own seat, hoping the taller man wouldn't get mad at him. Tohma's eyes narrowed as he watched Ryuichi fall asleep upon Eiri. _Damn, I need to find some horrible ailment or disease to catch to get with Eiri... _He peered over the seat back, surveying the first class. _...I wonder if anyone here has Ebola?_

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only a wee bit more! click over to the epilogue—i didn't have the heart to hold it back after those disgraceful six months, so i'm uploading them both at once. please, please, don't let that keep you from leaving a review here, though. tell us what you thought of the ending! let's break a hundred!

—**vethia**& **midori-chan******


	11. Epilogue

**disclaimer****:** see all previous disclaimers

* * *

Soft, chocolate hair fell upon a downy pillow as the NG singer turned his head to gaze at the bundle of bright, nearly fluorescent flowers Shuichi had effervescently given him this morning. He could still remember the beams of sunshine that little kid had opened up in his eyes when he came to visit him that day—for the first time in a while now, he felt like there were people actually_ there_ for him, people to hug when he was sad, or people to glomp when he was happy. It felt...very nice. 

            "Sakuma-san, you have a visitor." The nurse opened the door a crack and smiled cheerfully at Ryuichi. "Another one, that is."

            "Nn?" Ryuichi's eyes brightened as a jovial grin laced his pale cheeks. "Wahh, sankyuu~ Nurse-Lady!!" He lifted a hand to wave at her, the brightness in his face rivaling even that of the flowers.

            The nurse smiled at him and opened the door, revealing a tall blonde man squinting as he removed his dark sunglasses. Eiri stepped into the room, blinking slightly at the brightness, and greeted Ryuichi with a nod of his head. "Eh." He was dressed impeccably as usual, stuffing the sunglasses into his jacket pocket and resisting the urge to pull out a cigarette. Under his arm was a small, flat, rectangular package wrapped in brown paper.

            "EIRI-SAAN~~!" Ryuichi beamed broadly, waving to the blonde... and then noticed the package. "WAH~! Who's that package for, Eiri-san?" Eiri strode in and tossed the package on the bed. "You, baka. Do you see anyone else here?" His fingers twitched, again resisting the urge to light up. Eyes flickered around the room. "Nice place." He seemed slightly uncomfortable, out of his element; but he truly wanted to be there.

            "Sankyuu!!!!!" Ryuichi was a-bubble with life again, motioning to the chair beside the table with the flowers for Eiri to sit down. If one were to look at him, they couldn't even tell what he'd been through or what he'd endured. "Please, please sit down, Eiri-san~!"

            "Nhn." Eiri grunted his thanks as he took a seat, eyeing the flowers. "That particular garish shade can only have come from Shuichi."

            "Yup~! Aren't they pretty?" Ryuichi's eyes glinted as he turned from the flowers to Eiri-san. "It's really nice to see you, Eiri-san, I'm so glad you stopped by~~" Truly, the word 'happiness' would inadequately describe the emotion the boy was feeling right now. He had been hoping that Eiri-san would visit him... and he was rather ecstatic about the present, too, because while Nori-chan and Seguchi-san had each brought their own presents, things coming from Eiri-san took on a much greater value to Ryuichi.

            Eiri sniffed softly at the flowers and leaned back in the chair, staring out the window. "Eh. I didn't have anything else to do." At first, it seemed as if he wiould stop there, but he continued after only a short pause. "...Advance printing is done, and I've finished my next proposal." This was probably the most information Eiri had ever volunteered, unasked, about his life—even if it _was_ just about his career.

            "Ah! What's this book about?" Ryuichi turned his whole body to the side, the sheet moving with him and creating white tiers through the stretch of the fabric and the shape of the singer's legs.

            Eiri waved a negligent hand. "The same drivel as all the rest. It's really not that exciting." He seemed pleased, though, that Ryuichi would ask. "I'll begin working on it as soon as the publisher clears the budget drain it'll cost them."

            "Well, still—it must be nice to know that all your fans are waiting for your book." Ryuichi smiled genuinely, and gestured to one of Eiri's recent novels sitting half-open upon the bed. "They're really good, you know. I started reading them once I got into the hospital, and I really admire your style."

            Eiri actually cracked a slight smile. "Mmmnh" was all he said, but he was oddly touched by the singer's praise. "Well... I had better go." His eyes softened into something approaching fondness as he glanced at the flowers again. "That baka whines like hell when I'm late." He stood, rather abruptly, and turned towards the door, then seemed to hesitate. He looked back as he reached it. "Maybe I'll stop by tomorrow."

            "Yeah! That would be wonderful!!" Another grin from Ryuichi, as his eyes openly showed the thousands of 'thank you's that he could never bring himself to say to Eiri for visiting him. The writer quirked another tiny smile, then disappeared through the door, leaving the singer and the package behind him.

            Even though Eiri's back was turned, the singer waved goodbye to him, and paused for a moment, eyes lingering upon the doorway. His attention was suddenly rechanneled towards the enigmatic package sitting on the bed where Eiri had left it. "Ara..." Ryuichi grinned happily as he sat up and settled the present in his lap, beginning to unwrap it gingerly. 

            The brown paper was easy to rip off, peeling away to reveal... a book. It was hardcover, weighty and thick, with elegant kanji on the cover spelling out 'FAITH.' Slightly smaller, below the title, 'Yuki Eiri' is picked out in muted silver. A small, intricate mark on the top right-hand corner of the cover revealed this to be part of the first printing; only 10 or so copies exist in this fashion.

            Ryuichi could only stare at the book in a state of shock, cerulean eyes wide as they took in the shining treasure their owner held in his hands. "Ah..." Ryuichi took a quick glance to the door again, and then he tore open his window and leaned outside into the blowing wind, searching for a sign of Eiri Yuki on the ground below. 

            The novelist was barely visible outside the window, smoking a much-needed cigarette as he headed for his expensive car. The singer opened his mouth to say something, but instead, merely smiled as he caught a glimpse of the blonde. He closed the window carefully and sat back down upon the bed, staring at the book in wonder. Finally, after about a minute or so of silence, he opened the front cover. 

            Inside, in Eiri's angular penmanship, a note was inscribed: _Had to pull more strings than I care to mention to change the title so late before printing. Bureaucrats make me ill._ Then, a line below: _Here's that autograph you wanted._ Finally, at the bottom of the page, _Yuki Eiri_ was scrawled and underlined.

            The book quaked from Ryuichi's hands as tears fell from his eyes—although this time, they weren't tears of sadness. He hugged the book to his chest and flopped back down upon his bed, crying and hugging the book to him as if it were his dear Kumagorou. A nurse who had been standing in the doorway looked rather nonplussed as she viewed the crying boy in his bed. "...Sakuma-san? Are you alright? What happened?" Ryuichi opened his tear filled eyes, smiling so wide the edges of his smile seemed to run off the corners of his face. He hugged the book even tighter to him, opening his mouth to speak. Only one word came out, as golden as the title upon the book:

            "Faith."

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and that, folks, is that.

hope you liked it! been a long time coming, i know. anyway, i would like to thank the wonderful and amazing **Midori-chan** for being an amazing co-author, a wonderful friend, and an all-around great person; **Calliopeoracle** for support, roleplaying, friendship, and sweet sweet lovin'; **Kyvanna** for squees, encouragement, friendship, interest, and hours of ddr; **Savi** for impetus; the entire cast of **Faith in Gravity** for making it, while it lasted, the best damn Gravitation rp there ever was; and most of all, **you**, the readers. this story would never have existed without your encouragement and interest. thank you one and all.

now please, let us know what you thought of the ending, the characters, the story as a whole—all of it! the fact that there's nothing left to tell about _this_ story doesn't mean that i couldn't be persuaded to do more, if the readership were willing (hint hint wink wink nudge nudge). and also, i love knowing when people add this story to their favourite stories list or myself and midori-chan to their favourite authors list. if you do so, please let me know! thank you so much to everyone who already has!

signing off,

—**vethia** & **midori-chan******


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